In a period of heightened political activity, and moves towards negotiations, the regime continued to use the courts to suppress opposition. Labour disputes, struggles over housing, education and the bantustans, as well as celebrations after the release of Nelson Mandela, were met by police repression during the first three months of 1990. Demonstrations and meetings were broken up, activists harassed and hundreds of people arrested. The charges they faced, such as public violence and illegal gathering, confirmed the wide range of laws which the apartheid regime can still use to curtail political activity.
In January police conducted a raid on Kubusie, surrounding the village with barbed wire and searching all the houses. The raid occurred during a boycott by Kubusie residents of white-owned shops in nearby Stutterheim in the Eastern Cape. As a result 220 residents were arrested, of whom six appeared in the King William's Town Magistrates Court on 18 January on various charges including public violence.
Seven members of the Siyathuthuka Youth Congress were due to appear in the Belfast Magistrates Court in the Transvaal at the end of January on charges of public violence. The charges arose out of an anti-eviction march which was dispersed when police fired birdshot into the crowd. At least two people were injured, including one of the accused, Eric MAGAGULA. Residents have waged anti-eviction campaigns against the local authorities since 1988 and the latest protests were prompted by the eviction of a resident in mid-January. Parents of the accused said that they were being refused access to their children.
Events to celebrate the release of Nelson Mandela were also broken up by the police and arrests made. Two Border youths, Lungile MATHIYA (17) and Sitena MAQETHUKA (16), were killed when a policeman shot into a celebrating crowd in Barkly East. Forty-six residents were subsequently arrested on a number of charges including public violence, intimidation and obstructing the police. Two men from the northern Transvaal township of Zithobeni were charged with public violence after a stayaway on 12 February to mark Mandela's release.
Public violence charges were brought against five pupils in the Virginia Magistrates Court in the Orange Free State on 19 February. They also faced charges of intimidation and arson arising out of a class boycott. Pupils' demands included a democratically elected Students Representative Committee (SRC), and an end to corporal punishment and sexual harassment.
On 31 March the government extended for a year a prohibition on gatherings calling for educational boycotts or worker stayaways, other than those permitted under the Labour Relations Act. The ban had been in force since 1985, in addition to a ban — first imposed in 1976 — on all outdoor meetings held without official permission, apart from sports gatherings or funerals in cemeteries. Both bans had been due to expire on 31 March.
Thirty-four residents of Sonwabile, Maclear, were arrested at the beginning of February on charges of illegal gathering. The residents were involved in a consumer boycott and a stayaway in protest at living conditions in the Border township. They complained of overcrowding and poor sewerage, of no electricity and of insufficient school facilities. Twenty-seven of those charged were arrested after police used teargas and shotgun fire to disperse a group of protectors. At the end of January, in the same area, 23 people were arrested for taking part in an illegal procession in Matatiele, while at Ugie, police arrested 15 men who ignored a warning to end an illegal gathering.
In the Ciskei bantustan, a group of 52 Chalumna residents, ranging in age from 16 to 96, appeared in court at the beginning of February, charged under the bantustan's emergency regulations with holding an illegal gathering. They were arrested in Chalumna, near Mdantsane, on 5 February, four days after the declaration of a State of Emergency in the magisterial districts of Mdantsane and Zwelitsha. The regulations, covering the most densely populated parts of the bantustan, included a ban on meetings of more than four people. Rejection of bantustan rule had been growing in Chalumna and residents were reported to have returned membership cards of the ruling party to demonstrate their opposition. It was not clear whether the new administration in the bantustan would proceed with the charges.
In Cape Town, a total of 35 people who staged demonstrations outside Parliament in support of hunger strikers on Robben Island were arrested on consecutive days at the end of February and appeared in the Cape Town Magistrates Court. It is likely that they were charged under the Gatherings and Demonstrations Act which prohibits open-air gatherings and demonstrations near Parliament. An estimated 100 people were arrested in Cape Town in March following another demonstration in support of political prisoners. The march, organised by the UDF, did not have official permission and the police twice threatened to use water cannon on the marchers.
In September Vuyani APRIL (19) was convicted of murder in the Grahamstown Supreme Court. April was found to have been involved in the killing of the girlfriend of a policeman in Fingo Village, Grahamstown, in January 1987. He was given a five-year sentence. Six co-accused were acquitted. The court heard evidence from April and a state witness, Thozamile TSHETE, that they had been forced to make statements. Tshete stated that in fact he had no knowledge of the killing.
Eight Stutterheim men have been convicted in the East London Supreme Court of charges arising out of the killing of two men in Mgwali. They were allegedly part of a group which set fire to and stoned two houses in January 1986. On 25 January the accused were given sentences ranging from 9 to 12 years: details of individual sentences were not reported. The convictions followed lengthy proceedings, lasting almost four years, throughout which the accused were held in custody. An application for leave to appeal has been lodged.
Mgwali, outside Stutterheim, was placed under the control of the Ciskei bantustan from 1981 and its residents threatened with removal. The threat seemed to have been lifted in mid-1986 when the central government resumed control. The Mgwali Residents' Association (MRA) led the campaign against removals and its members suffered harassment and detention. Two of the accused were members of the MRA and others were said to have been involved in the organisation.
Two of the men, Mandla SAWULI (27) and MXolisi NTANISO (26) were found guilty on two counts each of murder and attempted murder, four counts of assault and one of malicious damage. Mase NDEVU (25), Mkokeli SOBEKWA (26), Ndayithi DELHLAZO (35), Vusumzi MAQHUBELA (28), MXolisi BATYI (33) and Mlandeli HABA (28) were found guilty of murder and of culpable homicide. The accused had protested their innocence throughout the trial.
Sawuli, Ntaniso, Sobekwa, Mase Ndevu and two other defendants, Mthuko KAMA (28), and Khandela NDEVU, testified that they had been assaulted by police at the time of their arrest. In January 1989 Khandela Ndevu was sent for psychiatric observation and in October it was reported that he had been declared a State President's patient and committed to hospital. At the same time it was revealed that Kama had committed suicide in prison.
