Many detainees under the Terrorism Act in South Africa are being maltreated. New and disturbing evidence to indicate this has come to light in recent weeks. Also, the number of detainees appears to be on the increase, but little information about them is reaching the press or is being published.
Amongst the incidents indicating a pattern of brutal treatment of detainees are the following:
- The sudden death in detention in Durban of a 50-year old former ANC member Mr. Masobiya Joseph Mdluli (see next page for details).
- An application to the Supreme Court by the wife of another Durban detainee, Mr. Harold Nxasana, for an order that a doctor and the chief magistrate be permitted to see her husband and report to a judge. In her application on 15 April Mrs. Clotilda Nxasana said that she feared that her husband, who was arrested on 5 December (see Focus No.2 p.9), had been severely beaten and was paralysed. She had met a woman in April who said she had seen Mr. Nxasana with police in Masonic Grove police station and that he appeared to be unwell. The informant added that a policeman remarked that Nxasana had injured his spine and was being taken to a specialist for treatment. On 13 April the wife approached the Security Police to see her husband, but was refused by a policeman who said 'jocularly' that they had killed him.
In a preliminary reply the respondents, (the Minister of Justice & Commissioner of Police) said that Nxasana had been visited by a magistrate on 7 April and was seen to be in good health. The hearing was adjourned to 22 April for the respondents to file replying affidavits. Mr. Nxasana, also a former ANC member, was a leading official of the National Union of Textile Workers and is on the staff of the Institute of Industrial Education in Durban. Both he and Mdluli were imprisoned in 1967 under the Suppression of Communism Act and banned for two years in 1968.
- At least two former detainees are suing the Minister of Police for damages for alleged assaults by the Security Police while in detention. Mr Mzimkulu Gwentshe of East London, who was detained under the Terrorism Act from October 1974 to March 1975, is claiming R3,500 after being kicked and hit with karate blows during interrogation, and being made to stand with outstretched hands, for long periods. The court ordered him to reply to the Minister's request for further particulars. Shortly before he was detained, Gwentshe was banned for 5 years. Mr Petrus Tshabalala of Soweto, after his acquittal on a charge under the Terrorism Act, lodged a claim for damages for alleged assault while in custody at Mafeking. After this incident, he had spent 12 days in Klerksdorp Hospital before appearing in court - see also p.12.
- In several other current or recent trials, witnesses and/or the accused have reported brutal treatment while in custody under the Terrorism Act. The cases include those of Molokeng and 6 other Africans, Molobi, Bloem, and see also No.1 pp 1 & 2.
No reliable information is at present available about the numbers of those in detention. A common feature of the many current and recent trials under the Terrorism Act in that state witnesses are produced of whose arrest and detention under the Act no previous report has appeared. On 14 February the Rand Daily Mail reported that a total of 80 persons
