Two men from Port Elizabeth, Mlungusi Malvern MBIYABE (37) and Nansame NZUBEM (30), were sentenced on 17 April to five years each, two years suspended conditionally for five years, by the Humansdorp Regional Court.
They were charged under the Internal Security Act with furthering the aims of the ANC and of importing and distributing ANC literature.
They pleaded guilty to importing 1,200 pamphlets and 75 ANC tape cassettes from Lesotho and distributing them in South Africa.
In the trial of Wordsworth Kholekile MHLANA (25) a state witness, Weaver Seralo MAGCHYE, was jailed on 20 March for three and a half years after refusing to answer questions and for giving a clenched fist salute from the witness box. Mhlana himself was convicted and sentenced to eight years imprisonment on 2 April. An application for appeal against both the conviction and sentence was refused.
Mhlana had pleaded not guilty to charges under the Terrorism Act and Internal Security Act in the Port Elizabeth Supreme Court on 9 March. During the trial the court debated for two weeks on the admissability of a statement made by Mhlana to a Johannesburg magistrate during his detention last year. The judge ruled the statement admissible despite a defence submission that the confession was not made freely and voluntarily. In evidence Mhlana said security police had forced him to make the confession by torture including electric shocks, assault, excessive physical exercise, starvation and a threat of drowning in the Vaal River.
An artist from Duncan Village, East London, Mandla GXANYANA (26), was acquitted in the East London regional court on 9 April of being a member of the ANC but was sentenced for possessing and distributing banned literature.
He was sentenced to one and a half year's imprisonment, half of which was suspended for five years, and fined R250 or three months.
Bonsile Philemon NORUSHE (34), local secretary of the African Food and Canning Workers' Union, was held for over seven months before he was called to give evidence in the trial of Gxanyana. He refused to testify and was sentenced to one year's imprisonment on 8 April.
Giving his reasons why he could not "betray" Gxanyana, he said "I cannot testify because his contribution is great to me and my nation".
Raphael Mzikayifani KHUMALO (24) and Raymond Veli DLUDLU (29) were both discharged in the Ermelo Magistrates' Court in April.
Khumalo was charged with having received military training outside South Africa and it was alleged that he had been in possession of large quantities of arms, ammunition and explosives which he intended to use for terrorist activities. Dludlu was charged with assisting Khumalo by transporting him from Swaziland into South Africa.
