The South African regime resumed execution of its political opponents in April 1989 by hanging two members of the Addo Youth Congress, Ndumiso Silo SIPHENUKA and Mackezwana MENZE. Another activist, Abraham MNGOMEZULU from Soweto, was executed in May while two others obtained a last-minute stay.
In the same period at least 19 additional death sentences were passed — five of them on combatants of the ANC and fourteen in one trial arising from a police killing in the Northern Cape town of Upington. At the same time six trade unionists had their death sentences commuted after massive international campaigns on their behalf while three other political prisoners on Death Row were acquitted on appeal and another was granted a retrial.
Siphenuka and Menze were among a group of four men sentenced to death in January 1987 for killing a farmer and his wife. They were granted a last-minute stay of execution in October 1988 to attempt to lead new evidence about the age of Similo Lennox WONCI, the youngest of those condemned. (FOCUS 79 p.12) In April it was announced that Wonci and Mziwoxolo Christopher MAKELENI (now aged 23 and 24 years respectively) would have their sentences commuted to prison terms of 25 years each. Siphenuka, aged 28, and Menze, in his forties, were executed on 20 April.
Relatives of the two men said they had urged their 'comrades to unite and carry on with the struggle'. Referring to the common purpose ruling under which they were convicted, Siphenuka's father said: 'It is an unbearable pain to see him being executed for a crime he did not commit. Even the judge who sentenced him said he did not care whether he killed the farmer or not'. Menze's brother Zukile, another member of the Addo Youth Congress, has also been detained.
Abraham Mngomezulu (25) was executed on 25 May after the Chief Justice had refused him leave to appeal against sentence and the State President declined to grant him clemency. He had survived an earlier execution date set for July 1988.
Mngomezulu was amongst a group of five youths convicted of killing a suspected police informer in Naledi in April 1987 during a stayaway in support of the Soweto rent boycott. His co-accused, aged between 16 and 19 years, were sentenced to prison terms. In his petition to the Chief Justice, Mngomezulu's lawyer argued that the court never seriously considered whether there was extenuation in Mngomezulu's case — the judge did not even give a reason for his finding that there was none — and this had led to a miscarriage of justice. However, in spite of this, Chief Justice Corbett refused to refer the matter to the appeal court and Mngomezulu was executed without a chance to present fuller evidence.
The judge ruled that Mngomezulu had not physically taken part in the killing but played a 'leading role' by telling others what to do. His lawyers argued that the witnesses in the case might well have exaggerated Mngomezulu's role in order to minimise their own, especially as he was the oldest accused. However, he had reached only the second form of secondary school and may well have been no more intellectually or emotionally mature than the others, even though he was biologically older. Furthermore his own moral culpability would have been diminished by the force of group pressure from the young people who carried out the killing. They were all 'outraged by [the] conduct of the deceased which they regarded as heinous and which threatened them.'
Some twenty-four hours or so before Mngomezulu's execution, Sibusiso Senele MASUKU and Oupa Josias MBONANE were granted a last-minute stay of execution after a state witness against Masuku retracted her evidence. Lawyers took this information to court on 23 May but it was rejected by Acting Justice Human, the trial judge, who also refused them leave to appeal against his finding. However, the Minister of Justice granted a stay to allow the Chief Justice to be petitioned on the matter. Justice Human previously presided over the trial of the Sharpeville Six.
Mbonane and Masuku were convicted of killing a policeman in Soshanguve in February 1986 — he was killed during a night vigil attended by some one thousand people for the victim of a police shooting. Masuku protested his innocence throughout. He was already serving a prison term at the time, having been sentenced for actions in furtherance of the ANC's armed struggle.
Delmas combatants condemned Three ANC combatants who refused to recognise the court trying them were sentenced to death on 27 April after being convicted of murder, while a fourth defendant was sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment for attempted murder.
Jabu Obed MASINA (36), Frans Ting Ting MASANGO (30), Neo Griffith POTSANE (28) and Joseph Elias MAKHURA (27) faced 49 charges when they appeared in the Delmas Circuit Court on 1 February.
The defendants' rejection of the court was complete. Masina read a statement on behalf of all the accused, explaining why they refused to plead to the charges. They had no legal representation although lawyers were present. The men declined to cross-examine state witnesses or lead evidence in their own defence.
'We are soldiers in a patriotic army . . . We believe that we are prisoners of war and that we should be treated in accordance with international rules governing such status.'
'The state of war which exists in South Africa is a war of national liberation and self-determination . . . We affirm that it is, as Article 1 of Protocol 1 of 1977 recognises, an armed conflict of the type in which peoples are fighting against 'colonial domination and alien occupation and against racist regimes in the exercise of their right of self-determination''
Jabu Masina — statement to court, April 1989
The men were convicted on the basis of evidence from state witnesses, including police and two unnamed former ANC members, and their own statements made while in detention. Although they did not formally challenge these in the court proceedings their opening statement proclaimed: '... all of us were held in solitary confinement without access to legal representation for eight months ... all of us were tortured and brutally assaulted. In the process information has been extracted from us by the security police which will in all certainty be used against us.' The men were assaulted again even during the trial, this time by warders at Modderbee Prison. The prison authorities alleged the men had refused to enter their cells. Boot marks were visible on their shirts and Makhura required emergency hospital treatment.
The most serious charges against the three arose from fatal attacks on two policemen and a bantustan politician. Sergeant Orphan Hlubi Chapi, notorious for his activities against youth in the Soweto Uprising, was killed in June 1978, allegedly by Masina alone. Masina was also convicted of three other murders on the grounds of conspiracy and common purpose with Masango and Potsane. In March 1986 Masango allegedly killed Constable Sinki Vuma, one of those responsible for the Mamelodi massacre of November 1985.
