In February bans were placed on two people who were prominent in the black community in Natal. Both were active in organisations playing a leading part in the campaign to boycott the Republic Day celebrations.
They were Florence MKIZE, of the Women's Federation of South Africa, and Mr. A.S. CHETTY, chairman of the Pietermaritzburg branch of the Natal Indian Congress. Both are banned for five years under the Internal Security Act. They are under house arrest between 6pm and 6am on weekdays, and over weekends.
Florence Mkize, one of the leaders of the Women's Federation of South Africa, was the Natal provincial organiser of the African National Congress from 1955 until its banning in 1960.
The Women's Federation has recently been active in the campaign against compulsory education. Florence Mkize herself spoke on the issue at the funeral in January of Sebinah Letlalo, a former ANC activist, where she represented the Natal group of former ANC members. Recalling the history of the struggle against Bantu Education she said, "Today, we mothers are selling our children by signing those compulsory education forms".
The Women's Federation has been active in promoting the formation of a national committee to campaign against the Republic Day celebrations.
Florence Mkize's banning order restricts her to the Lamontville township and the Durban magisterial district, and she may not enter any other African, Indian or Coloured township. She has to report once a week to a police station.
The current banning order is not her first. She was arrested on 20 March 1960, the day the African National Congress was banned, and released in June the same year. The following year she was detained as she was preparing to go into hiding; she was subsequently charged and released after being found not guilty.
Then in 1962 she was served with a five year banning order. In 1967, the year her banning order expired, she organised a condolence meeting for Chief Luthuli, for which she was arrested and imprisoned for three months. On her release she was banned again for five years, until May 1973.
Mr. Chetty, as well as being chairman of the Pietermaritzburg branch of the Natal Indian Congress, was also chairman of the Maritzburg Housing Action Committee. He was described by the press as "the prime mover" of an Indian boycott of the Republic Day festivals. He was also an outspoken critic of the platoon system used in Indian schools because of the shortage of classrooms, and was chairman of the Platoon Action Committee.
The banning order confines him to the magisterial district of Maritzburg and prohibits him from having any visitors except his son and daughter-in-law.
This is the second time Mr. Chetty has been banned, having been under a five year banning order from 1973 to 1978. He was detained in May 1980 at the height of the school boycott along with other leaders of the Natal Indian Congress.
Laurence NTLOKOA, a former executive member of the Young Christian Workers (YCW) was sentenced on 12 March to six months imprisonment for breaking his banning orders. When the court sentenced him, he was in detention under the General Law Amendment Act, having been detained on 14 February.
It was alleged in the Johannesburg Regional Court that he had contravened his banning order by attending an illegal gathering and being in a school. The meeting, one of many that day to commemorate the 1977 bannings of organisations, was at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church in Kagiso.
In July 1980 Laurence Ntlokoa, the youngest person ever to be banned, was found guilty of breaking his banning orders by going to the cinema without permission; he was sentenced to four months suspended for three years.
Juby MAYET, a former journalist on the Voice, was found guilty of breaking her banning order and sentenced in the Johannesburg Regional Court to 50 days suspended for 18 months.
A King Williams Town couple, Mr. Malusi MPUMLWANA and Ms. Nandisle MPUMLWANA were found guilty in January of breaking their banning orders by leaving the magisterial district of King Williams Town without permission in December 1980.
They appeared in the East London Regional Magistrates Court. Mr. Mpumlwana was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment and Ms. Mpumlwana to six months. Both sentences were suspended for five years. Malusi Mpumlwana was formerly a field worker for the Black Community Programme, until he was banned for five years in 1973. He was detained a number of times: in August 1976, March 1977 and in October 1977, when he was held in preventive detention under Section 10 of the Internal Security Act. His banning order expired while he was in detention and he was banned again on his release in December 1978.
Nandisle Mpumlwana (formerly Thoko MBANJWA) spent several months in preventive detention during 1976. Formerly editor of Black Review and Black Viewpoint, she was banned in 1977.
