Steve BIKO (30) honorary president of the Black People's Convention and a banned person, was charged on 22 March with defeating the ends of justice.
It was alleged that in a sabotage trial earlier this year he persuaded schoolstudent witnesses to give false evidence against seven of their fellow students accused of conspiring to set fire to a school, who were found not guilty. According to evidence on Biko's behalf given by one of the boys concerned, he and others had been forced to sign an unseen paper by the police, which they had apparently later retracted. Another boy denied that Biko had told him to change his statement in court. Seven other students again gave evidence for the state, one of whom described a meeting at which all the witnesses agreed to change their statements.
The case was postponed to 11 July.
