The widespread campaign inside and outside the country for the restoration of study rights for political prisoners removed in 1977, may have borne fruit. The Minister of Prisons announced in the House of Assembly on 12 May that "prisoners convicted of security crimes would have their study privileges restored". He also announced that the Commissioner of Prisons was studying the possibility of allowing such prisoners a daily newspaper. Mrs Helen Suzman MP called for a judicial commission to investigate parole or remission for security prisoners.
In early March a meeting took place of the Concerned Friends of the Prisoners of Conscience organisation, established by former detainees. The meeting discussed ways of assisting contacts between detainees and their relatives, and the fear of visiting detainees by relatives because of possible police intimidation.
A group of United States Congressmen have launched a campaign to 'adopt' prisoners and banned people. The project's organiser, Mr Tom Downey, said individuals chosen would be those "who still cling to the hope of non-violent change". Letters would be sent to the South African Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice, prisoners and their families. Spokesmen for the programme's sponsors, the ad hoc Monitoring Group on Southern Africa, believe the project will help promote peaceful change in South Africa.
Families of political prisoners held at Pretoria Prison alleged in January that the prisoners were suffering as a result of the escape of Moumbaris, Jenkin and Lee. The Prisons Department denied this and added that it was "not the department's policy to comment on routine and administrative aspects concerning the administration of prisoners". The families now report that the prisoners have been moved to a section of Pretoria Central Prison, where it is thought there are few facilities. The political prisoners section from where the escape took place is being modified.
Four women serving prison sentences for political offences at Potchefstroom female prison have been charged with contravening prison regulations. They are:- Sibongile Mthembu (a former SSRC member sentenced to 4 years for sedition) Feziwe Bookholoane (serving 8 years) Elizabeth Nhlapo (5 years) Dorothy Nyembe (15 years) According to the charge sheet the women refused to go to their cells when ordered to do so on 1 March. The hearing was postponed to 24 April. The four women are believed to have gone on an 8-day hunger strike up to 5 May.
In Port Elizabeth, the family of Mr Zwelibanzi Nzothoyi were-evicted from their home. At the administration offices an official said rent payments would no longer be accepted. Mr Nzothoyi was jailed for seven years in 1978 for sabotage.
According to the Minister of Prisons, there were in March 1980 a total of 482 prisoners serving sentences under security legislation in Robben Island prison, of whom 53 were from Namibia. 38 of these have life sentences.
The banning of the South African Council of Churches Dependants' Conference in the Transkei meant that "Christian work of compassion and mercy is now a crime in the Transkei" according to Bishop Desmond Tutu, SACC Secretary-General. The protest against the ban was echoed by the Presbyterian Church which said the Transkei was not only depriving its people of material aid but also acting against the proclamation of the gospel, and by the Congregational Church which called the ban "an act of totalitarian tyranny".
According to Bishop Tutu, the Dependants' Conference spent about R10 000 a month assisting over 180 families of those detained, banned and in prison for political offences. It also provided help to newly-released political prisoners for rehabilitation. It was suggested that the Transkei ban was one of the conditions for the recent loan of R74 million received by the Transkei authorities from the central South African government.
In November the Dependants' Conference held its annual meeting in Cape Town, when the director Miss Anne Hughes said R520 000 had been received from overseas sources in 1979 and R17 000 from local sources. The Conference was helping more than 700 families of political prisoners, over half of them in the Border area of the Eastern Cape, and also over 125 families of detainees through the Ecumenical Trust Fund. Rev. M. Mogoba of the Federal Theological Seminary in Natal, who spent three years on Robben Island, was elected national vice-chairman of the Conference.
