Eight men were acquitted of all charges under the Terrorism Act in the Port Elizabeth Regional Court on 25 April. They were Wellington GUMENGE (23) Paul KHUMALO (32), Wandile DAYILE (24), Fikile MOHILI (19), Vusumuzi ZIBONA (18), Wandile GCAKAZI (19), Lizo MULA (18), Aba DAYILE (18) all of Port Elizabeth.
After 18 months in custody and a trial lasting a year, all were found not guilty of attempting to leave South Africa for military training and of robbing a van driver of R330. KHUMALO and Wandile DAYILE were also acquitted of assisting the others to leave and travel to Botswana. This trial has not been covered in FOCUS (apart from a brief mention in June 1979) as the first press reports of proceedings appeared only in March 1980 when a large demonstration in support of the accused at the courthouse caused the judge to order that the trial continue in camera.
The acquittals were the result of conflicting evidence from the security police on the way in which statements were taken from some of the accused. Defence counsel said that from the time of their arrest, the eight accused had been slapped, kicked, punched, butted with a gun and cajoled by the police into admitting they were guerillas. The magistrate said he was not satisfied that some form of duress was not used in obtaining the statements.
During the trial it also emerged that the police falsely told the family of ZIBANDA that he had been shot dead while trying to cross into Botswana and that his body would only be released if they made a satisfactory statement about him.
