The South African regime's policy of using the legal system to intimidate its political opponents was stepped up in early 1988 with a series of political executions. The regime prepared for this in February by banning the South African Youth Congress (SAYCO) which had spearheaded the campaign to save the lives of those sentenced to death for offences arising out of political protest and also by restricting the capacity of COSATU and other organisations to campaign on the issue.
In just eleven days between 18-29 March the regime planned to execute 21 prisoners including 13 featured on a list compiled by SAYCO. A massive international campaign on behalf of six of these prisoners known as the Sharpeville Six combined with urgent court action by their lawyers resulted in a stay of execution for them. However, political executions were carried out on 18 and 25 March when three youth activists, Tsepo LETSOARE, Michael LUCAS and Mlondolazi Benjamin GXOTHIWE were hanged.
Those struggling to save the lives of condemned prisoners faced many problems even in the case of the Sharpeville Six, the most publicised case. On 14 March their lawyer - in the words of a newspaper - heard 'via the grapevine' that the six, sentenced for the killing of a Lekoa town councillor, were to be executed four days later. At that time he had not received a formal response to the petition for clemency submitted to the State President in January 1988.
News of the date of execution of the Sharpeville Six came while relatives of two of them were in London as part of an international tour to raise support. Julia Moipone Ramashamola, mother of Theresa RAMASHAMOLA, and Joyce Mokhesi, a sister of Francis Don MOKHESI, also travelled to the United States and the Federal Republic of Germany in their campaign. An unprecedented number of countries made appeals on behalf of the six - Mofalefa Reginald SEFATSA, Malebo Reid MOKOENA, Oupa Moses DINISO, and Duma Joshua KHUMALO as well as Ramashamola and Mokhesi. In spite of this, President Botha refused to exercise clemency on their behalf. Newspaper reports attributed this partly to a need to show strong support for prospective councillors in the run-up to elections in October.
However, in the glare of international media attention, the lawyers were successful in obtaining a one month stay of execution to apply for a re-opening of the original trial on account of 'new evidence'.
The grounds for the stay centred on the evidence of a previously unnamed state witness, student Joseph Manete. Even before the original trial Manete had made a statement to a lawyer stating that he was assaulted in police custody and forced to implicate two of the accused; Khumalo and Mokhesi, in the making of petrol bombs. Manete's evidence corroborated the testimony of another unnamed state witness against the other four accused, hence all six were affected by the application.
In the original trial, Judge Human would not allow defence lawyers to cross-examine Manete on his statement saying it was a 'privileged' communication between lawyer and client. However, on 17 March, Human decided that sufficient grounds did exist for a stay of execution. The lawyers were given until 18 April to file their application for the trial to be re-opened. They would then be given a date for the hearing of the application and the execution notice would be temporarily suspended.
Although massive national and international publicity focussed on the Sharpeville Six it was only revealed on 19 March that the Prisons Department had set seven, not six, executions for the previous day. Tsepo Letsoare, a 23-year-old member of the Port Elizabeth Youth Congress (PEYCO) was executed alone.
Letsoare had been in custody for almost three years, first as a detainee under the 1985 State of Emergency, then as an awaiting-trial and convicted prisoner. He was charged with the murder of an alleged police informer. He denied the charge, his defence lawyers arguing that the prosecution witnesses had contradicted each other. However, Justice Mullins sentenced Letsoare to death on the basis of a statement which had been obtained during interrogation, even though he subsequently repudiated it. The relatively short period between conviction and execution - six months - suggests that Letsoare was refused leave to appeal. Nor was there any report of a petition for clemency to the State President.
The following Friday, 25 March, another PEYCO member sentenced in the same month as Letsoare was also sent to his death without publicity or reported protest - Mlondolazi Benjamin Gxothiwe was charged with killing a policeman in December 1985. He was convicted following evidence of identification by a single police witness. Again it seems that the sentence, delivered by Justice Solomon, was never subject to appeal.
Executed alongside Gxothiwe was school student Michael Lucas whose last-minute appeal for a stay of execution was rejected on 24 March. A thousand people attended a service in Cape Town for Lucas on the eve of his execution.
Lucas came from the Southern Cape township of Bhongolethu, Oudtshoorn, whose people have been stirred to militancy by the abysmal living conditions imposed on them by apartheid. Lucas was convicted of the murder of a bus inspector killed during a bus protest. During 1985 Bhongolethu suffered some of the worst state repression monitored in South Africa: affidavits collected there were published by the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference. Lucas was a young school student. His exact age was uncertain: he was first said to be 17, but in August last year the court ruled that he was between 20 and 21 years old. Under South African law the death sentence is not mandatory if the accused is under 18 years at the time of the offence.
Lucas was refused leave to appeal against his conviction and the finding that there were no extenuating circumstances, ultimately, by Acting Chief Justice Rabie. In their last-minute application his lawyers argued that Rabie's appointment was unconstitutional. Rabie was Chief Justice until early last year when he reached the mandatory retirement age of 70. However, instead of retiring, his period of office was extended for a further two years during which he is to be known as 'Acting' Chief Justice. There was a good deal of disquiet in legal circles at the prolongation of Rabie's appointment - he chaired the Commission of Inquiry into Security Legislation which led to the 1982 Internal Security Act.
It was later revealed that two of those executed on 29 March may have been involved in political protest even though their names were not on SAYCO's list. Sipho MOHALA (21) and Lungile REWU (19), from Zwide, Port Elizabeth, were said to have been sentenced for a 'necklacing' committed in 1985 when Rewu was only 17. 'Necklacing' is often used in the South African press to refer to a death resulting from political protest rather than to describe a method of killing. No details of the trial were reported in the press at the time.
In the same week the Appeal Court in Bloemfontein rejected an appeal by Robert McBRIDE, an ANC combatant sentenced to death in April 1987 for the murder of three women killed in a bomb blast in Durban in June 1986. McBride was also responsible for the daring escape from hospital of fellow combatant Gordon Webster.
McBride's lawyers thought his appeal had a good chance of success - even one of the assessors in his trial had dissented from the majority decision and found that there were extenuating circumstances. The appeal emphasised the effect of apartheid on his development, conditions in his home area of Wentworth, the impact of the State of Emergency against which he was protesting and the role of an accomplice who had turned state witness. On 31 March, however, the Appeal Court ruled that it could only reverse the trial court's finding on extenuation if there was evidence of misdirection, but that it had found none.
Even as the executions were carried out, new death sentences were handed down. By the end of March, Gilindoba GXEKWA, a member of the Uitenhage Youth Congress, had been sentenced to death three times in three different trials. In at least two cases he was convicted on the basis of statements made under duress.
Gxekwa was first sentenced to death, alone, in August 1987 for killing a suspected police informer in Kwanobuhle in March 1985 in the days following the Uitenhage police massacre. In November he was brought into the Port Elizabeth court with three others - Xolani Moses STUURMAN (25), Vuyani Petrus JACOBS (19) and Monwabisi Milo KINIKINI (19). They were all charged with killing Monwabisi Fanayo, a suspected police informer, in Kwanobuhle in December 1985. Kinikini was subsequently acquitted.
Defence lawyers challenged the admissibility of statements made by Gxekwa and Stuurman, stating that they had been obtained after torture. This was supported by evidence from an independent source - a magistrate to whom Stuurman had complained told the court he kept private notes of Stuurman's allegations on the advice of a superior who warned him that the police would not preserve the document on which he registered the complaints. The magistrate observed injuries on Stuurman's arms and legs and found these consistent with the electric-shock torture he said he had suffered.
Gxekwa, a former school-mate of the dead man, told of being kicked, sjambokked, hooded and tortured with electric shocks before making a statement to a magistrate.
On 22 February Gxekwa, Jacobs and Stuurman were all sentenced to death and refused leave to appeal against both conviction and sentence.
Four residents of Hanover in the Eastern Cape who were convicted of murder in June 1987 were sentenced to death in January 1988 after the Grahamstown Supreme Court rejected defence arguments on extenuating circumstances. They were charged with four others following the stoning of a man in Kwezi, Hanover in December 1985.
The defence led two witnesses in mitigation: United States psychiatrist Professor Michael Simpson testified about the reduction in an individual's responsibility during crowd violence and a professor of psychology, Noel Chabani Manganyi, referred to the violence and abnormal psycho-social climate in South Africa. During his evidence Professor Simpson placed on record his objection to being 'badgered' by one of the assessors sitting with Justice Le Roux.
Mxolisie NCAPHAYI, Vuzumsi JACK, Samson BOOYSEN and Bennet SONAMZI were all sentenced to death. Ncaphayi, a member of the Hanover Youth Organisation, was said to 'have played a 'leading role'. Three others, all of whom were under 20 at the time of the incident, were sentenced to 18 years' imprisonment each: Nontlopeko MDOLA, Elvis NELANI and Magi SIYOKO. Richard YEBE was convicted of culpable homicide and sentenced to five years' imprisonment.
