With the death sentences passed on two combatants of Umkhonto we Sizwe in May, the number of people facing execution for convictions arising out of political protest rose to at least 59. Fifty-five were held in Pretoria Central Prison where they represented over one fifth of those on Death Row (reported to be 273 in April). At least four more political offenders awaited execution in bantustan prisons.
MNCUBE AND NONDULA
Mthetheleli Zephania MNCUBE (27) and Mzondeleli Euclid NONDULA (24) were sentenced to death in the Supreme Court in Messina on 4 May for their participation in the ANC's armed struggle. They had faced some 40 charges including murder and attempted murder, and various contraventions of the Internal Security and Arms and Ammunition Acts. Most of the murder charges arose from landmine explosions in the Messina area of the northern Transvaal in late 1985.
Although charged jointly, Mncube and Nondula had not acted together, nor met before the trial. Mncube spoke eloquently of his role as an MK soldier and his demand for prisoner-of-war status. However, both men denied involvement in the landmine explosions featured in the indictment and Mncube was acquitted on one murder charge. The men were detained between December 1986 and January 1987: the state alleged they left South Africa after laying landmines and were picked up a year later when returning to carry out another mission.
All the explosions occurred within the Soutpansberg Military Area. A commandant in the South African Defence Force (SADF) denied that Soutpansberg was an 'operational' area, claiming the police, and not the army, remained in ultimate control. Evidence was given by people who had survived the explosions, including two farmers who each lost three family members in an explosion on 15 December 1985. A newspaper report at the time described the families as travelling 'without military clearance'. It was also stated that local farmers were all incorporated into commando or other military structures. During evidence about Mncube's capture it was established that one of his companions was shot dead by a Messina farmer participating in a military search of the area.
Two witnesses gave evidence under assumed names and in camera. One, whom the state sought unsuccessfully to be allowed to give evidence masked with a balaclava, was described as a 'rehabilitated' member of the ANC now working for the South African Police. He alleged he knew both the accused from ANC training camps in Angola. The second man, who also identified the men, was said to have surrendered to the police but was reportedly detained as a state witness under Section 31 of the Internal Security Act. The accused's defence lawyer totally denied that he knew the accused or that they knew him.
Mncube was first captured on 26 December 1986 in an operation which left four of his companions dead. The corpses of three were thrown on top of him in the back of a police truck and he was driven to Messina. The group's weapons were also left in the truck. Although blindfolded, he managed to release his wrists which had been tied together and, in order to escape, shot into the driving cab. The two policemen escorting him were fatally wounded.
Eight days later, Mncube was recaptured, having spent that time with virtually no food or water, in temperatures of 33 degrees centigrade. Farmers who saw him told reporters he was in 'a terrible state'. His defence lawyers charged that he was brutally assaulted, humiliated and refused water. A Pietersburg doctor who was doing his military service with the SADF and was asked to examine Mncube said he saw his 'primary responsibility' as being to decide whether Mncube could withstand further interrogation.
Mncube's lawyer detailed a number of assaults on his client, in the worst of which a policeman trampled repeatedly on Mncube's stomach, as he lay on the ground chained and handcuffed, until he soiled himself and lost consciousness for about a minute. Mncube was then made to sit on a chair, dirtying it in the process. He was ordered to lick his faeces off the chair before being allowed water.
If I am a murderer then members of the South African Defence Force who have raided the ANC in other countries also have to be brought to court. Mthetheleli Mncube
Nondula was detained at a roadblock by a Bophuthatswana bantustan military unit on 2 January 1987 and was later handed over to the South African Security Branch. The evidence against him came primarily from a statement he made to a magistrate on 8 January, and the defence challenged its admissibility. Nondula spoke of being held naked, chained and blindfolded in a prison cell, deprived of water and toilet facilities. He was assaulted and interrogated at great length, only making the statement out of fear. Psychological evidence was led in support of this but Justice J P O de Villiers ruled the statement admissible.
Evidence linking Nondula and Mncube to the landmines was very weak, relying on pictures allegedly showing them 'pointing out' the sites of the various explosions. Nondula said that a local white farmer accompanied him and the investigating team to help identify the places. For Mncube, it was argued that he was unfamiliar with the area - as proved by his inability to find and cross the nearby Zimbabwe border after his escape - and so could not have pointed out sites so accurately a year after seeing them.
After the men's conviction a number of defence witnesses spoke in mitigation - including Professor Fatima Meer on the men's background, Professor John Dugard on their right to prisoner-of-war status and Rev. Frank Chikane of the South African Council of Churches. Mncube addressed the court twice. He spoke of military discipline under the ANC and how when his unit encountered civilians on 26 December 1986, while on a mission to reconnoitre the SADF, they were instructed by their commander not to shoot. Both men had been politicised from an early age - Mncube had seen two of his friends killed by police during the Soweto uprising; Nondula, who left the country in 1981, narrowly escaped with his life when the SADF invaded Lesotho in December 1982 killing 42 people - refugees and Lesotho nationals.
In sentencing, Justice de Villiers differed from recent cases where death sentences have only been passed for convictions of murder. Both Mncube and Nondula also received one sentence of death each for 'terrorism'. Mncube received three other death sentences - for the death of the two policemen and a man killed by a landmine explosion in November 1985. Nondula received six other death sentences for the civilians killed in December 1985. Both also received 25-year prison terms.
SHARPEVILLE SIX
In the Pretoria Supreme Court on 13 June Justice Human rejected an application for the re-opening of the trial of the Sharpeville Six and ruled that only the State President had the power to do this. They were granted a further stay of execution until 19 July to petition the Chief Justice for leave to appeal against his decision.
NEW DEATH SENTENCES
Four more names of people sentenced to death have become known, but with almost no other details. 'CLIFFORD' and 'REUBEN' were sentenced in Nelspruit in November 1987 for the murder of a suspected police informer. In March Rodney MOLOI (24) and Stanford LEBEPE (24), from Tembisa, were sentenced for allegedly killing a police informer.
In the third trial involving Gilindoda GXEKWA (25) of the Uitenhage Youth Congress, he and three others were sentenced to death for the alleged killing of a police informer. It was Gxekwa's third death sentence and the second for co-accused Vuyani Petrus JACOBS (21). Seventeen Uitenhage youths were charged with the murder: one absconded, six were acquitted, six were convicted of public violence only, while Mthetheleli LUCAS (24) and Tozamile MOOI (27) were also sentenced to death.
The case arose from the death in October 1985 of a former comrade of the accused, Thozamile Dondashe, whom they believed was acting as a police informer. He had obtained guns 'from the Boers' and they were anxious to find where he had hidden them. Dondashe was taken from his home by a crowd and was found dead the next day.
Those convicted of public violence only, were found to have participated in the attack on Dondashe's house to demand his attendance at a meeting but that this took place before any decision to kill him had been formulated. The defence argued that no such decision was ever made in advance of the killing, which occurred in a 'group environment' and against a background of severe unrest in the area between 1984 and 1986.
Philip KINIKINI (22), who was sentenced to two and a half year's imprisonment, had himself had a brother burnt to death in March 1985. Tembile MATANA (28) and Sipho NXELE (21) received three years, Morris MICHAEL (20) got two years and Njamana KINIKINI and Fumanekile BOYCE (both 18 years) received 18 months' imprisonment each. All the accused had already been in custody for two years.
It was acknowledged by the court that none of the four sentenced to death had administered the fatal blow but Justice Van Rensburg said this did not 'render their actions less morally reprehensible'. Gxekwa and Jacobs were apparently convicted on the basis of statements they had made and Mooi and Lucas on the grounds of common purpose in that they had 'actively associated with the people who had put Dondashe to death'.
