The trial of two young men in Pietermaritzburg on charges of high treason was transformed on 1 August when they were joined by ten other alleged ANC guerillas, all charged with high treason, 43 alternate counts under the Terrorism Act and conspiracy to commit murder under the Riotous Assemblies Act.
The hearing took place in Pietermaritzburg Supreme Court where a special shatter-proof glass wall enclosed the dock. The accused are John SEKETE (24) Tladitsgae MOLEFE (23) Jeffrey LEGOABE (30) Thibe MGOBENI (27) Andrew MAPHETO (20) Bennet KOMANE (46) Titus MALEKA (25) Sydney CHOMA (23) Mandenkosi HADEBE (27) Mandla MTHETWA (22) Vusimuzi ZULU (28) and James MANGE (24). Of these, Hadebe and Mthetwa had previously appeared, changing their plea to not guilty when legally represented. The others first appeared on 16 July in Pietermaritzburg Magistrates' Court.
They pleaded not guilty and the case was remanded to 4 September. When the trial began, the prosecution applied for evidence from certain state witnesses to be heard in camera. The 12 accused, through their defence lawyer, disputed this, and when the judge ruled against them, they dismissed their lawyer and told the court they wished to take no further part in the proceedings. They argued that the nature of a treason charge was a crime against society, yet the public were being excluded from the trial.
The charge sheet alleges that the accused recruited people, trained them in the art of warfare, armed them and deployed them in South Africa for the purpose of overthrowing the government. The accused are themselves alleged to have been trained in Angola, at the Engineering, Benguela, Nova Gagenga and Quibaxe camps, in Zambia at the Manabeshe ZAPU camp, and in the USSR at the Pirivali camp in the Ukraine.
They are further said to have attempted to bring rifles into the Msinga area of Natal, to have established arms caches in the Ndumo and Nongoma areas of Natal and to have reconnoitred pipelines at Merebank near Durban in order to commit sabotage. Other allegations concern "subversive activities" in the Transvaal and Cape Province.
The start of the prosecution case related to these 'activities', when reference was made to a clash between two armed guerillas and a police patrol near Zeerust, Transvaal, on 1 August 1978. Later, it was claimed by police, John Sekete, the first accused, had shown the police various arms hiding places in the Zeerust district during November 1978, after his arrest. Sekete was arrested by Bophuthatswana police and handed over to Maj. Ras of the SA security police after being assaulted. Maj. Ras also told the court of another gun battle on the Botswana border in January 1979, during which one guerilla was shot dead. The man was identified by his fingerprints through the centralised pass-law system as Richard Mapela; the alleged connection with the accused was not reported in the press. At the time, one man was said to have been captured in the skirmish.
The choice of treason charges for this major trial of alleged ANC guerillas marks a departure from the practice followed since 1967 when the wide-ranging Terrorism Act was introduced for use against those charged with attempting to overthrow the government. Treason charges were last used against 156 Congress Movement supporters in the famous 'Treason Trial' of 1956-61, which ended in the acquittal of all accused.
