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🇿🇦 South Africa /Conflict & Security

Sabotage and cover-up: Inquiry hears 1967 plane crash ‘wiped out’ man who could have changed South Africa’s history

From Daily Maverick · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources Under investigation
  • Robyn Lichter told the Khampepe Commission that academic and former Hendrik Verwoerd adviser Johannes Bruwer may have been seeking to change South Africa’s history when he died in the 1967 crash.
  • She described alleged state interference, including pressure on Bruwer’s family and an apparent focus on recovering a briefcase carried by passenger Audrey Rosenthal.
  • The crash killed all 25 people aboard, and Lichter said the families endured years of trauma and unanswered questions.

Robyn Lichter told the Khampepe Commission that the 1967 plane crash may have removed a man who was preparing to challenge the future of apartheid South Africa. Johannes Petrus van Schalkwyk Bruwer, a 52-year-old academic and acting chair of the secretive Afrikaner Broederbond, died when the Rietbok plunged into the sea off Kayser’s Beach near East London.

“The man who was wanting to change the history of this country was wiped out,” Lichter told the inquiry. South Africa’s history, she said, “would have been very different if he had been successful”. Lichter, now 70, was 11 when the crash killed all 25 people aboard, including her father, Joseph Blankfield.

The man who was wanting to change the history of this country was wiped out

· Robyn LichterLichter told the Khampepe Commission that Johannes Bruwer may have been working to alter South Africa’s political course when he died in the crash.

Bruwer had served as a friend, speechwriter and adviser on African affairs to former prime minister Hendrik Verwoerd. According to testimony presented by Lichter, he had been working on a five-year plan after confronting what the article describes as the inevitable failure of white Afrikaner nationalist rule. His son, Johan Bruwer, later described him as deeply disillusioned when he boarded the Vickers Viscount for Johannesburg.

would have been very different if he had been successful

· Robyn LichterShe described the possible historical consequences of Bruwer’s political work.

Lichter said Bruwer’s family was summoned to East London to identify his remains. His son drove through the night but was turned away from the mortuary because officials claimed there had been a mistake. A comment that Bruwer was “not terribly injured or disfigured” only deepened the family’s suspicions, she said.

His wife, Cora, received a payout equivalent to R675,000 and was threatened with the loss of pension or financial support if she pursued an investigation. Lichter said the children grew up carrying a traumatic sense of guilt, believing their father’s political work had caused the crash. She also told the commission that passenger Audrey Rosenthal had spent five weeks gathering information for the banned Defence and Aid Fund. After the crash, she said, officials appeared more concerned with recovering Rosenthal’s briefcase than finding the bodies. The testimony forms part of an inquiry into delays in prosecuting cases after the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

not terribly injured or disfigured

· Officials, as recalled in testimonyThe comment reportedly made to Bruwer’s son after he was turned away from the mortuary added to the family’s suspicions.
About this summary

Originally published by Daily Maverick in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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