Three more death sentences were passed in May on members of the National Union of Mineworkers as the regime continued to use the death sentence as an instrument of repression. In addition the Appeal Court turned down an application for leave to appeal from two men sentenced in 1986. At the same time a number of trials involving capital offences were proceeding in courts around the country.
Tjeluvuyo MGEDEZI (28), Solomon Mangaliso NONGWATI (38) and Paulos Tsietsi TSEHLANA (38) were, among eight miners charged with murder and attempted murder following the killing of four team leaders at the Vaal Reefs gold mine.
Six miners were convicted of murder but in the case of Mbalumdaka, Frans Stone MAKHANYA (36) and Edwin Nkatutu MASIKE (39), extenuating circumstances were found. Mbalumdaka, whose role in the attack was described by Justice Strydom as 'minimal as he [had] only sung and danced while the others attacked the inmates of the room' was sentenced to an effective 10 years'. He was armed with a spear and a stick while stoning the team leaders' room. Makhanya, who was said to have broken off branches from a tree and distributed them to the attackers, and Masike were both sentenced to effective sentences of seven years' each. A seventh accused, Monwabisi SKETI (27), was acquitted on all charges. Charges were formally withdrawn against Thoo, a migrant worker from Lesotho, who died a day before the trial began.
The death sentence was delivered in a court packed with team leaders and mine officials. The men's families live at least three hundred miles from the mine in the Transkei bantustan. Mgedezi, Nongwati and Tsehlana reportedly 'looked at each other in disbelief' after the court interpreter told them they were to hang. During the judge's pronouncement they had merely stared at him. The men, described as NUM shaft stewards, had all worked at Vaal Reefs for many years.
Mlami Wellington MIELIES (22) and Mnyanda Moses JANTJIES (21) who were sentenced to death in November 1986 for the murder of councillor Benjamin Kinikini and five others, four of them his relatives, were refused leave to appeal in the Bloemfontein Appeal Court in late May.
The appeal by six Sharpeville residents – Mojalefa Reginald SEFATSA, Reid Malebo MOKOENA, Oupa Moses DINISO, Theresa RAMASHAMOLA, Duma Joshua KHUMALO and Francis Don MOKESI – sentenced to death in December 1985 for the murder of a councillor is to be heard on 10 September.
