The scale of repression during recent months is reflected in the very large number of trials. In the six months from September 1984, 10,000 people were arrested on charges arising out of the unrest. In the Eastern Cape alone more than 20,000 people were arrested in the first six months of 1985 on charges of violence. These cannot be adequately covered in FOCUS, but some aspects of the role of the courts in the repression of resistance are illustrated below:
Amongst the many trials which form part of the repression of resistance in the recent period are several in the PWV area involving charges which could mean heavy prison sentences or even the death sentence. Some heavy sentences have already been imposed.
Two trials recently completed arose out of the stay-away by workers in the PWV area in November last year. During the stay-away there were outbreaks of stoning of buses and police vehicles in several townships of the East Rand.
Six activists from Ratanda (Heidelberg) were found guilty of public violence in the Heidelberg Regional Magistrates' Court on 23 August. The sentences ranged from two and a half to six years' imprisonment. Eighteen months of a five year sentence on Ernest PITSO (20) were suspended in view of his age. Charges against seven others were withdrawn.
In the second trial Manase Jonas MSIBI (17) was found guilty of murder, four charges of attempted murder and malicious damage to property, arising out of an incident in the November stay-away in which a PUTCO bus was petrol bombed. One person died and four were injured. Msibi was sentenced on 6 August in the Rand Supreme Court to 12 years' imprisonment, five of which were suspended after the judge found that his motivation in throwing the bomb was political. However the judge did not accept an argument by the defence that Msibi should be imprisoned on Robben Island as a political prisoner. Mandla DLAMINI (23) and Clive RADEBE, who were originally charged with MSIBI, were acquitted in June.
Four other trials involving serious charges which also relate to resistance in the PWV area last year are in progress. Thirteen residents of townships in the Vaal appeared in the Oberholzer Magistrates' Court on 6 September on charges of murdering two Lekoa Town Councillors in September 1984. Eight from Sebokeng were also charged with subversion and alternatively with malicious damage to property and arson. The case was postponed until 23 September to be heard in the Pretoria Supreme Court. The remaining five from Sharpeville were separately charged with murder and subversion. They were due to appear in the Oberholzer Magistrates' Court on 10 September.
Funyane MABONE (23) and five others appeared in the Klerksdorp Regional Court charged with sabotage and placing public safety in danger. The charges relate to resistance in Khuma Township near Stilfontein. The case was postponed to 15 October.
Two trials are in progress which relate to unrest in Duduza this year. Sebenzile BANI and nine others appeared in the Dunnottar Magistrates' Court on 24 May charged with murder. The charges relate to an incident in the previous week when youths stoned cars on a road passing the township. A white woman died as a result of injuries sustained when she was dragged from her car and stoned. The nine were released on bail of R100 each and warned to appear again on 21 June. Six more arrests have been made relating to the case, but those detained had not been charged by the end of May.
Matlakala MOTAUNG (27) and ten others have been charged with the murder of Maki SKHOSANA. They are alleged to have stoned and burned Skhosana to death at a mass funeral in Duduza in July. The murdered woman was accused of being a police informer by mourners. Ten accused appeared in the Nigel Magistrates' Court on 19 August after being remanded in custody at an earlier appearance. They pleaded not guilty. At a subsequent appearance on 2 September a 14 year old boy was also charged.
In the Eastern Cape, evidence of police violence and other misconduct was produced in a number of trials.
At the New Brighton Magistrates' Court on 30 August a 15 year old boy showed 17 scars on his back and head as well as other lacerations which he said had resulted from assaults carried out during interrogation at the security police headquarters. He had been arrested with 11 others on a charge of murdering a policeman in Kwazakele on 8 June. Another of the accused, Edgar NGOYI (54), a former Robben Island prisoner and the regional president of the UDF, described how three defendants, all youths, had been 'in agony' because of police assaults. Bail was denied and the hearing adjourned to 20 September.
On 9 September the Grahamstown Supreme Court heard of the admission to hospital of Tetani JORDAN (29) who had been held since 2 September on a charge of public violence. A relief worker at the East London Crisis Centre, set up by the Catholic Church to assist victims of the repression, he required assistance to enter the magistrates' court on 4 September because he could not walk as a result of police violence. Despite this his bail application was rejected. Three days later he was admitted to hospital under police guard. In his affidavit he described how the soles of his feet had been beaten, electric shocks administered, a hood placed over his head and other forms of pressure applied to persuade him to give information about a local UDF leader. The court issued an order restraining the police from assaulting or torturing him, with a return date set for 24 October.
A further restraint order was secured in the same court on 10 September by the parents of seven children and youths aged from 12 to 19 charged with murdering a policeman in Grahamstown on 3 September. The police did not contest their allegations of 'torture, brutality and sadism'. A return date was set for 17 October.
In a number of other cases heavy jail sentences were imposed by the courts as part of the state's attempt to suppress township protests. Tembiste XOLA (23) was sentenced to 14 years' imprisonment in the Uitenhage Regional Court on 12 August after being convicted of arson attacks in Despatch involving a government building, a school and two trucks. An unnamed youth (16) was jailed for 10 years in the New Brighton Regional Court on 26 July on charges of arson and the attempted murder of a police warrant-officer at Zwide. His four co-defendants, aged from 16 to 18, were convicted of arson and received five or six year sentences.
In the Western Cape congested courtrooms testified to the scale of popular protest and the repressive activities of the police, army and judiciary. Restrictions on the march on 28 August to Pollsmoor Prison, where Nelson Mandela is held, and the banning of COSAS on the same day, inevitably raised the level of protest and repression, and there were 28 dead, over 200 injured and 235 people arrested in the following week.
On 26 August Wynberg magistrates postponed two of three scheduled cases to November. This was to allow a resumption of the trial of 22 people charged after a march at Rondebosch on 8 August, when a thousand students protested at the State of Emergency. Both postponements resulted from magisterial initiatives in advance of scheduled hearings, resulting in lengthy postponements. The appearance of the banned Cape Town community leader, Johnny Issel, and two others on charges including one of resisting arrest on 14 August was postponed for a second time to 12 November.
The other postponement involved 19 religious and UDF leaders arrested at a road-block outside Guguletu township on 10 August as they attempted to attend a funeral. Those charged included the Rev. Allan BOESAK and a Muslim leader, Imam Hassan SOLOMON (43). The postponement was to 6 November.
The hearing of charges against the 22 people accused of attending an illegal gathering at Rondebosch was itself again postponed by Wynberg magistrates on 26 August to 16 September. The defendants included the former student leader, Christine BURGER (25), and an unnamed 17 year old girl.
On 30 August, two days after the Pollsmoor march and the COSAS ban, the press reported that the Wynberg Magistrates' Court was 'too busy' to hear the bail applications of the Methodist leader Rev. Abel HENDRICKS and 11 others, who were arrested when police charged a crowd assembling at the Athlone Stadium for the Pollsmoor march. Their application was postponed to 2 September, when it was granted and the date of the hearing on a charge of attending an illegal gathering adjourned to 23 September.
The problems of the courts were compounded by the reluctance of magistrates to grant bail to activists: in three cases on 30 August, Wynberg and Bellville magistrates refused bail to 58 applicants. In one case involving the Anglican minister, Rev. David RUSSELL (40), the Muslim Judicial Council President, Sheikh Abdul GABIER (50), four unnamed youths and 23 others who were arrested as they attempted to walk to Pollsmoor, the defendants complained that they had been denied food and a change of clothing and were forced to strip while in police custody from 28 to 30 August. A tear gas canister had also been thrown into the truck carrying 21 of them to court, causing them to choke and vomit. Bail for the 25 adult defendants was however refused until 2 September.
Emergency regulations in the Transkei bantustan in force since 1980, and in particular curfew regulations imposed on 22 July, the day after the regime declared a State of Emergency, have resulted in many court appearances.
Seven men appeared in the Umtata Magistrates' Court on 26 July and were found guilty of violating the curfew regulations. They were sentenced to fines between R10 and R60. The accused were found guilty of being outside the boundaries of the premises in which they were residing between the curfew hours of 10 pm and 5 am.
Another 300 people appeared in a magistrates' court in the second week of August for breaking the curfew and were sentenced to a fine of R500 or 30 days' imprisonment. The 300 ranged from university lecturers to factory workers.
As a result of class boycotts many students have appeared in court to face charges of contravening the emergency regulations.
Fifteen students of the University of the Transkei appeared in court after the university residences had been closed on 21 August. They were charged with damaging doors and windows at the university. Another 102 students who attended the trial were arrested for not having permission to leave class. The students, who are classified as 'affected persons' under the emergency regulations, all paid R20 admission of guilt fines.
More than 400 students at the Umtata Technical College were convicted at the beginning of September of 'not attending college without authority'.
In the Ciskei bantustan area many students and pupils have also been convicted for various forms of protest.
On 21 August 230 pupils of the Gobizembe High School paid R40 admission of guilt fines in the Alice Magistrates' Court after being charged with holding an illegal gathering on their school premises.
Nineteen people convicted of public violence in 1982 after a protest at Fort Hare against the leader of the Ciskei bantustan, had their sentences lengthened when they appealed against them. The original sentences were fines of R400 with a further 300 days' imprisonment conditionally suspended for three years. On appeal in the Ciskei Supreme Court in July, the sentences were lengthened without the option of a fine. The 19 were sentenced to between one and three years' imprisonment. Included among the appellants was Alfred METELE, a field worker for the Border Council of Churches who has previously been detained.
Shootings at point blank range. On several occasions police and troops have shot at bystanders and at people at point blank range, using both rubber bullets and live ammunition (in several cases inside their homes) and opened fire indiscriminately on gatherings. A Saulsville infant (aged three) died when shot at point blank range by a rubber bullet. A Pretoria trade union member died when police opened fire on a group of people who tried to prevent them from assaulting a colleague. In Port Elizabeth police deployed around the Phakanisa Secondary School scaled fences and indiscriminately fired into a peaceful gathering of pupils, killing two. Also in July in Bongweni (Colesburg) police hiding in a house ambushed youths passing in the street, killing four of them. In the same township, police provoked young people into stoning an armoured vehicle by placing a youth on top of it and repeatedly assaulting him and then opened fire on them.
In incidents in the Ciskei bantustan, Eastern Cape and at Kwaguwa (Witbank) young people have also been killed at random by bantustan security forces and SADF soldiers.
The major of Cape Town raised with the police several claims of brutality and indiscriminate shootings, in the course of the suppression of local unrest in September.
Rape In at least two reported incidents SAP and SADF personnel have been accused of raping women. Police are alleged to have raped a fifteen year old Soweto school girl in the Protea police station in August after arresting her. Two SADF soldiers raped a 70 year old grandmother, who subsequently went into hiding because of alleged police harassment.
Interference with injured people In August the Eastern Cape Supreme Court granted an injunction against the SAP, restraining them from further harassing and intimidating the staff of a private clinic in Duncan Village, set up by Catholic clergy to assist people injured in the local unrest. Staff at the clinic alleged that police detained them, threatened them at gun point and arrested the drivers of vehicles transporting wounded people.
These developments reflect events elsewhere. Police have entered hospitals seeking out and in some cases taking into custody people wounded by the police. Police have also instructed doctors in the townships not to treat patients with bullet wounds. In several areas injured people have been too afraid to go to hospitals.
