Three more political detainees have died in police custody, bringing the total to 18 deaths in the past year. The three new cases were:
Elmon Malele (52) a former ANC member, who died in a Johannesburg nursing home on 20 January after a brain operation apparently following a stroke. Malele was arrested on about 9 January following an explosion in a Soweto house when one man was killed; his wife was also detained. A police post mortem was carried out at once and the funeral took place on 31 January.
Matthews Mabelane (23) a high school student from Soweto and son of a priest, alleged to have died on 15 February after jumping from a window on the tenth floor of the police HQ at John Vorster Square in Johannesburg during interrogation. According to the Commissioner of Police the interrogation was taking place in a room with unbarred windows because all the barred offices were occupied, owing to 'the number of detainees that had to be held since the June riots'.
According to his parents, Mabelane disappeared from home last October, when the police round-up of students was at its height, and is thought to have fled to Botswana. His parents reported his absence to the police. In January Mabelane was arrested, apparently as he returned to South Africa; police informed his parents that he was in detention on 27 January but before they were able to see him he had died.
Samuel Malinga (45), from Soweto, died in hospital in Pietermaritzburg on 22 February, apparently from respiratory failure or a stroke. He was being held by the Natal security police under Col G.J. Dreyer, as a Terrorism Act detainee.
Two earlier victims, whose deaths were briefly reported in FOCUS 8 were: Dr Naboath Ntshuntsha, arrested 14 December, died in January in a police cell at Leslie, allegedly by hanging himself. By 24 January the body had still not been released for burial and a question in Parliament elicited from the Minister of Police the information that 'unauthorised incisions' had been made at the mortuary; this rendered a complete post-mortem impossible, according to the pathologist retained by the family. One incision was from throat to groin and the other from ear to ear across the top of the skull. Dr Ntshuntsha was buried on 5 February.
Lawrence Ndzanga, trade unionist from Soweto, arrested 16 November, died 9 January in Johannesburg Fort, from natural causes according to the police. Ndzanga was due to appear in court with his wife Rita on 11 January charged under the Terrorism Act. Following a post mortem, the funeral took place on 23 January attended by some 5000 people, According to a speech at the funeral, Ndzanga worked for the betterment of black people and 'died for the liberation of black people' in doubtful circumstances: 'some of us have been in detention and we know what happens behind those windowless walls'. Mrs. Ndzanga, though granted bail of R5000, was not released from jail in time to attend the funeral.
An unidentified young African detainee fell four storeys from a window at Krugersdorp police station and was taken to hospital in a serious condition. No further press reports on the case appeared.
INQUESTS
MOHAPI: the inquest into the death of Mapetla Mohapi in Kingwilliamstown on 5 August 1976 was told by the pathologist who conducted the post mortem for the police that he died from force applied to the neck. According to police evidence he died by hanging himself with two pairs of jeans from the bars of his cell. An alleged suicide note written on lavatory paper was read to the court as follows: 'This is just to say goodbye to you. You can carry on interrogating my dead body. Perhaps you will get what you want. Your friend Mapetla'. After two days, the court recording machine broke down and the inquest was adjourned until 14 March.
MAZWEMBE: the inquest into the death of Luke Mazwembe in Cape Town in September 1976 was told by a pathologist that the abrasions on Mazwembe's neck were consistent with both suicide by hanging and 'faked suicide' following death.
MASHABANE: a verdict of suicide by hanging was returned by the Johannesburg Magistrate's Court in the case of Jacob Mashabane, who died at Johannesburg Fort on 5 October.
MDLULI: the government pathologist who examined the body of Joseph Mdluli in March 1976 and described the extensive injuries inflicted appeared as a defence witness in the trial of ten ANC men in Durban, when he stated that the injuries were of so diffuse a nature they were unlikely to have been caused by a single fall over a chair, as alleged by police. Later two sets of photographs of the body and injuries were exhibited in the trial: the police photographs showed fewer injuries than those taken on behalf of the family before burial.
On 25 February the Natal Attorney General announced that no further action would be taken over Mdluli's death, as there was 'not even a prima facie case' for doing so.
INQUIRY DEMAND
The now regular announcements of the deaths of political detainees in the hands of the SA security police has aroused anger, indignation and demands that impartial inquiries be held into the deaths. In a leader the London Times remarked that internal inquiries and occasional reprimands are insufficient: "The constant excuse of the police that the prisoners took their own lives is itself a clear admission that torture, physical and psychological, is extensively employed, is carried to extreme lengths and is on an increasing scale. It is evidence that Mr. Vorster's government is imperturbed by the occasional judicial reverses their men suffer, and suggests that the police and the warders' methods are to its liking... "The South African government may refuse an international inquiry, but it must be told that so low has the reputation of its justice fallen that no other inquiry will be acceptable. Default must, therefore, be entered as an admission of guilt."
