In July 1966, at the age of forty-eight, Tsafendas obtained a temporary position as a parliamentary messenger in the House of Assembly in Cape Town. When he first decided to take action against Verwoerd, Tsafendas planned to kidnap the prime minister. However, he soon realised that it would be impossible to do this on his own since his former comrades from the SACP were not keen on participating in anything risky or violent. With the access his new job permitted him, he decided instead to assassinate Verwoerd. He believed that since he had the opportunity to act he was morally obliged to do so, believing as he did that Verwoerd was "the brains behind apartheid" and that without him a change of policy would sooner or later take place. Years later, he told two priests who visited him in the hospital, "Every day, you see a man you know committing a very serious crime for which millions of people suffer. You cannot take him to court or report him to the police because he is the law in the country. Would you remain silent and let him continue with his crime or would you do something to stop him? You are guilty not only when you commit a crime, but also when you do nothing to prevent it when you have the chance."