THE ROAD TO DEMOCRACY, VOLUME 1, 1960-1970

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORDBy President Thabo Mbeki

PREFACE

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION: THE POLITICAL CONTEXTBy Bernard Magubane, Phil Bonner and Noor Nieftagodien

CHAPTER 2: THE ROAD TO ARMED STRUGGLEBy Philip Bonner, Ben Magubane, Peter Delius, Jabulani Sithole, Janet Cherry and Thozama April

CHAPTER 3: PEASANTS’ STRUGGLES OF THE 1960S: THE CASES OF GAMATLALA AND ZEERUSTBy Siphamandla Zondi

CHAPTER 4: RURAL RESISTANCE IN MPONDOLAND AND THEMBULAND: 1960 – 1963by Sukude Matoti and Lungisile Ntsebeza

CHAPTER 5: THE NATIONAL COMMITTEE OF LIBERATION (NCL)/AFRICAN RESISTANCE MOVEMENT (ARM) By Magnus Gunther

CHAPTER 6: THE PAC: “WAR AGAINST THE STATE”, 1960-1963By Brown Maaba

CHAPTER 7: “WE ARE GOING TO KILL THE WHITES”: POQO/PAN AFRICANIST CONGRESS STRUGGLES IN PRETORIA LOCATIONS, 1958-1964by Sello Mathabatha

CHAPTER 8: ‘LAND AND LIBERTY!’: THE AFRICAN PEOPLES’ DEMOCRATIC UNION OF SOUTHERN AFRICA DURING THE 1960SBy Robin Kayser and Mohamed Adhikari

CHAPTER 9: STATE REPRESSION IN THE 1960sBy Madeleine Fullard

Chapter 10: POLITICAL IMPRISONMENT AND RESISTANCE IN SOUTH AFRICA: THE CASE OF ROBBEN ISLAND, 1960-1970By Noel Solani and Noor Nieftagodien

CHAPTER 11: THE ANC IN EXILE: 1960-1970

By Sifiso Ndlovu

CHAPTER 12: THE WANKIE AND SIPOLILO BATTLESBy Rendani Moses Ralinala, Jabulani Sithole, Gregory Houston and Bernard Magubane

CHAPTER 13: THE ANC AND THE WORLD, 1960-1970By Sifiso Ndlovu

CHAPTER 14: THE MOROGORO CONFERENCE: A MOMENT OF SELF-REFLECTION FOR THE ANCBy Nhlanhla Ndebele and Noor Nieftagodien

CHAPTER 15: THE POST-RIVONIA ANC/SACP UNDERGROUNDBy Gregory Houston

CHAPTER 16: ABOVE-GROUND ACTIVITY IN THE 1960sBy Martin Legassick and Christopher Saunders

The Sharpeville massacre of 21 March 1960 was a decisive turning point in South Africa’s history. It marked the climax of a decade of mounting, non-violent resistance to apartheid centred among the black majority of the country’s inhabitants. Sixty-nine defenceless anti-pass demonstrators were killed on that day, mainly shot in the back; 186 were injured. It also signalled the opening of a much more brutal and intensive phase of state repression which would, in the space of a few years, largely crush internal resistance. Immediately following that eventful day tension and conflict between the apartheid state and the liberation organisations rose sharply. The state introduced a battery of draconian measures: the African National Congress (ANC) and Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) were banned, a national state of emergency was declared and security laws and institutions were extended and reinforced. The ANC and PAC for their part called at first for mass action. Later they reconstituted themselves as underground movements and finally launched their respective armed wings (Umkhonto we Sizwe – MK – and Poqo) who embarked on various forms of armed resistance. This period of increasingly violent struggle was brought to a halt with the detention and imprisonment of hundreds of resisters, most famously the Rivonia trialists.

The state’s violent reaction to the anti-apartheid movement, including numerous deaths in detention and the banning of countless individuals, forced many of those who remained actively engaged in the battle against apartheid into exile. The cumulative effect of these measures was the shattering of the internal liberation movements and the restoration of ‘stability’. What followed these tumultuous events was the consolidation of apartheid: the repressive state apparatus was enormously expanded and the economy experienced an unprecedented boom that benefited mainly the minority white population. The 1960s have accordingly been described as the ‘golden decade’ of apartheid. That golden age was, however, only the privileged experience of a racial minority; for the majority of oppressed black people it was a ‘dark decade’ of unprecedented repression.

This book provides new insights into the operation of the liberation movements during the 1960s. This it does by drawing on previously untapped

documentary sources such as trial records, state archives, and the archives of the liberation movements themselves. More important, however, it includes the voices and experiences of scores of liberation veterans, who courageously and selflessly fought the apartheid regime in the 1960s; and who paid heavily for this either through lengthy jail sentences, exile, or a combination of both. Their life experiences have been recorded by a team of researchers working for the South African Democracy Education Trust (SADET) in different parts of the country whose labours have yielded an incomparably rich archive of taped personal testimonies. This is SADET’s particular legacy to the future.

The study also challenges the notion that the 1960s was simply a decade of political quiescence. When compared to the mass defiance campaigns of the 1950s or the revolutionary upheavals that followed the Soweto uprising in 1976, the period under discussion certainly represented a low point in the history of the liberation struggle. However, as the various chapters in this book demonstrate, not even the intense repression of the 1960s by the state could crush the spirit of resistance. Impressive numbers of men and women refused to bow down to this yoke of oppression and contributed hugely to the ultimate destruction of apartheid.

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION: THE POLITICAL CONTEXT

Chapter 1, written by Phil Bonner, Bernard Magubane and Noor Nieftagodien, sets the scene for the subsequent analyses of the liberation movements in the 1960s by explaining how the Nationalist Party achieved power in 1948 and how it ruled through the 1950s and 1960s, particularly during the premiership of H.F. Verwoerd (1958-66). It also charts the evolution of the resistance from the early 1940s and focuses attention on the mass struggles of the 1950s that culminated in the massacre at Sharpeville.

Excerpts

“In the run up to the 1948 election the term apartheid served more as a rallying political slogan than as a clear policy blueprint. Perhaps because of the unexpectedness of victory apartheid’s programme remained rather vague and unelaborated when the NP assumed power. Policy guidelines committed the party to a future in which ‘the most important ethnic groups and sub-groups should be segregated in their own areas where every sub-group will be enabled to develop into a self-sufficient unit’, and that Africans in urban areas be regarded ‘as migratory citizens not entitled to political and social rights equal to those of whites’.”

“More typical was a less intellectual desire to restore unqualified white domination and black subservience which was being eroded or unbalanced by the need to economically exploit African labour which could not be separated from the bearer of that labour - the African himself. The 1913 Land Act had reserved thirteen percent for the sole occupation of the ‘Native’, from whom the white economy could draw whatever labour it needed. Nearly everywhere else black existence was unlawful. So-called white South Africa had 87 % of the landmass to themselves, including all major cities, permitting Africans, who comprised 68 percent of the population in 1951, only the small parcels of arid reserves. In terms of the Urban Areas Act of 1923 it was illegal for Africans to enter, let alone reside in cities. The reserves were constituted in such a way that those who resided there would be compelled by pangs of hunger to

sell their labour where it was needed in the ‘white economy’, which counted on them.”

“Malan’s new regime did not take long to change the whole character and perspective of the South African State. And for the first time in the history of Union government only the Afrikaans language was heard at cabinet meetings. That nothing would be allowed to stand in the way of the Malan regime to redesign the South African society from top to bottom was soon to be made evident by a slew of laws aimed at separating the blacks from whites. Between 1948 and 1950 a steel-net of legislation was passed to frustrate any possibility of building a common front among those denied the franchise. These laws included the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act which banned interracial marriages, the Immorality Act, which barred interracial sex, the Population Registration Act classified every individual in South Africa by race, the Group Areas Act mandated strict residential segregation, and the Separate Amenities Act extended segregation to public places and transportation.”

“In 1949 the ANC adopted the Programme of Action (PA) which paved the way for a new era of organised mass militant action. The Programme was both a declaration of principles and a formulation of the methods that should be adopted to achieve them. On both subjects it broke new ground. It affirmed that the fundamental principle of the ANC was ‘to achieve national freedom from White domination and the attainment of political independence. This’, it went on, ‘implies the rejection of the conception of segregation, apartheid, Trusteeship or white leadership which are all in one way or another motivated by the idea of white domination’. To achieve these goals it urged the adoption of more aggressive tactics such as boycotts, strikes, civil disobedience and non-co-operation. The PA was widely hailed as a triumph of the militancy of the ANC Youth League, which had been campaigning against the methods of the old leadership as outdated and inadequate to meet the challenge presented by the ruthlessness of the Nationalist Party Government.”

CHAPTER 2: THE ROAD TO ARMED STRUGGLE

One of the most significant chapters in this volume, with contributions from Phil Bonner, Bernard Magubane, Peter Delius, Jabulani Sithole, Janet Cherry and Thozama April, deals with the ANC’s turn to armed struggle after the banning of the key liberation organisations in early 1960. Some of the central issues dealt with here are: the factors which gave rise to the ANC’s decision to abandon peaceful forms of resistance and to turn to violent methods, when the decision to turn to armed struggle was taken and the question of which organisation within the Congress Alliance was the first to take this decision, and the key debates and problems arising from the turn to armed struggle. The chapter concludes with analyses of the establishment of MK and the early underground structures in various regions of the country, and the activities of various regional MK commands until the Rivonia arrests.

Excerpts

“The ANC’s institutional commitment to non-violence was deep seated and long lasting. For some this amounted to little more than the pragmatic acknowledgement that a resort to armed struggle under prevailing circumstances was simply

impracticable. For the majority of ANC members, however, non-violence was elevated to the status of a principle. The two attitudes all too often blurred into one another. It took numerous outrages and shocks before the resulting axiomatic non-violent consensus was displayed. Among some it took numerous outrages and shocks before it was displaced. It was never entirely relinquished. A collective decision to engage in a still relatively muted and restrained form of armed struggle was taken in the second half of 1961. Pressure had been building up to move in that direction since the Sharpeville massacre and the banning of the African National Congress and the Pan Africanist Congress in April 1960. The balance was tipped in favour of violent resistance by the bloody repression of ANC-led stayaways in June 1961.”

“Flag Boshielo, who was a member of the underground Communist Party and the ANC and the driving force behind the movement Sebatakgomo which played a catalytic role in the Sekhukhuneland Revolt, was particularly taken with the issue of armed resistance in the early 1950s and devoured all the literature that he could find on the Mau Mau. He went to Sekhukhuneland in the early 1950s to train as a herbalist and to explore the possibilities for rurally based armed resistance. On his return he argued still more strongly for serious consideration of armed struggle. The Mau Mau revolt is not often cited as a source of inspiration by interviewees, but for some individuals events in the South African countryside may have merged with earlier insurgency in East Africa to underscore the possibilities of rurally based armed struggle.”

“Once the ANC and detainees were released in late August 1960, energies were channelled in two directions; firstly rebuilding the ANC underground and laying the foundations for mass mobilisation; secondly preparing for armed struggle. To begin with, the bulk of those who remained politically active were engaged in the first area of activity. It is therefore to this that we first turn. The National Executive of the ANC held its first formal underground meeting in September. Among the decisions it took for underground work was to create new structures of co-ordination with unbanned Congress organisations and to dissolve the ANC Youth and Women’s Leagues. Both decisions provoked serious opposition among leaders and members who had absolutely no idea of what was required to operate as an underground organisation. According to Elias Motsoaledi, the Youth League leadership refused point blank to dissolve, its Secretary General Mtite retorting ‘the ANC would swallow us’. It took months, as we shall see later, for this instruction to be obeyed. Another aspect of organisational streamlining which was in some instances rejected was the slimming down of provincial and local executive committees from 25 to 7.”

“Personal recollections of this period, and of the decision to move to armed struggle are often noticeably coy about who first took this decision, the SACP [South African Communist Party] or the ANC? A common fudge is to aver that they occurred ‘at about the same time’. Joe Slovo, for example, in his autobiography, observes that, ‘By June 1961 the Central Committee of the Party and the Johannesburg Working Group of the ANC had reached consensus on the need to form a military wing and to prepare for its initial phase of armed struggle.’ A good deal of evidence suggests that the Party made this momentous break not only separately, but first. In neither case was the decision easy or uncontested.”

“More or less the same individuals were thus driving the decision for armed struggle in the ANC and SACP. ‘They were’, as Sisulu succinctly puts it, ‘the same groups who had been discussing in different ways’. Bernstein makes a similar point observing that ‘It wasn’t a joint process, it was a parallel process, each body considering what it was going to do’. At the same time, ‘because our membership was interchangeable at certain levels ... there was nothing we did the ANC didn’t know about and nothing ANC did that we didn’t know about’.”

“The Transvaal Regional Command [of MK] was composed of Hodgson, Motsoaledi and Abel Mthembu. There, as elsewhere, December 16 was scheduled for the first acts of sabotage and the public announcement of MK. Ed Dube led one attack and Elias Motsoaledi the other. In both cases bombs went off prematurely because the detonators were faulty. In the first Dube was killed.”

“The Western Cape features peripherally in most accounts of MK. The attention of commentators and scholars alike has been drawn instead to the more spectacular high profile activities of the PAC, most notably, the march on Cape Town led by Philip Kgosana on 30 March 1960, and the Paarl insurrection of November 1962 which are discussed at length elsewhere in this volume. Yet ANC and MK activity in this area was a great deal more conspicuous than this historical amnesia suggests. Cape Town was the scene of 35 MK attacks in the brief period of 1961-2, the second highest in the country after the Eastern Cape. Many of those arrested in connection with these acts were resident in the township of Nyanga. It is to the immediately preceding history of Nyanga that this section first turns its attention.”

“The turn to the armed struggle had presented the Natal Regional Command of Umkhonto we Sizwe with an unique set of problems. Most members of the Regional Executive Committee (hereafter REC) of the ANC were not recruited into the Regional Command of MK. When the news broke out that a Regional Command had been formed problems surfaced. They believed MK to be a parallel structure to the REC since newspaper reports had said that MK was an armed wing of the ANC. They felt that they should have been informed about its formation since they were supposed to be in control of the organization. They then demanded that the suspected members of MK should explain the situation. The dispute intensified between members of the ANC with nationalist tendencies and those who were aligned to the Communist Party and the trade unions. In Durban George Mbele, Dorothy Nyembe, Elias Kunene and others featured prominently in the nationalist bloc.”

CHAPTER 3: PEASANTS STRUGGLES OF THE 1960S: THE CASES OF GA-MATLALA AND ZEERUST

Siphamandla Zondi focuses on the rural struggles of the 1950s in Chapters 3 as part of the radicalization of the broader anti-apartheid resistance movement within South Africa and as manifestations of the increasingly ruthless apartheid intrusion into the countryside. These rural struggles were multi-faceted. At one level, the struggles burst out into violence with a lot of publicity, particularly with regard to the Mpondoland, Zeerust and Sekhukhuniland revolts. These were well covered in the media, especially the progressive newspapers like New Age and The World, while some of the very vital participants have been interviewed. These revolts appeared as focused on one or two

particular apartheid legal instruments, the Betterment Scheme and the Bantu Authorities, but in many ways they were a culmination of a conflict that had been simmering over a decade or more. So, at another level, it is this simmering tension that is captured in greater detail in this chapter. The evolution of the rural struggles in Zeerust with all its flashpoints is the focus here.

Excerpts

“By and large, the initiative for resistance had passed on to migrant labourers who were exposed to resistance politics through trade unionism and other political activities in the towns. The literature on this subject has demonstrated the significance of the migrant labour system in the turn of events in the late 1950s in places like Sekhukhuneland, Wietsieshoek, Pondoland and Dinokana (Zeerust). Suffice to say here that migrant labourers brought some organizational form to the widespread discontent and disillusionment with the attack on bokgoshi [the institution of traditional leadership]. In Ga-Matlala, we cannot discount the early presence of the ANC in the area, creating political consciousness among the largely peasant population. There was certainly a shift towards the rural areas in ANC strategy in the 1920s, as ‘native’ reserves became important to the government’s development planning. This shift is often seen as the beginning of conservativism, and the increasing influence of traditional leaders in the movement. However, a careful analysis of rural struggles gives a more complex picture, one in which rural political activism broadened without a clear organizational form or policy support by the movement.”

“The committee also liased with the deportation committee of the ANC set up to provide welfare for the victims of deportation. In 1961, an ANC lawyer, Douglas Lukhele, mounted a legal campaign challenging the validity of the deportation. So the ANC influence in the events was growing year by year. The death by suicide of Mafura in 1961 amid indications that Makwena’s deportation was to be legally overturned provided hope to Makongrese [Congress supporters]. But the delay in court proceedings caused impatient Makongrese to send a delegation to Johannesburg to seek guns from MK commanders, where they were advised to wait until other areas were mobilized as well as Ga-Matlala, which alone could not launch armed resistance against apartheid.”

“Those who escaped arrest fled to the surrounding mountains, stayed for months in the freezing caves and lived on anything from handouts to tubers and wild fruit. In distant villages, rogue elements used the tensions to confiscate livestock and other possessions of those who had fled. After one such meeting the people of Lekurung village in the north-western end of Ga-Matlala area, whose main economic activities were goat tending and transportation, had their donkeys and goats confiscated. ‘We didn’t know what the destruction was about’, laments Matlou Matlala, ‘after a short while they came back and they went in looking for my husband.’ Fortunately, her husband who was also a representative of the Congress in the village, was not in. People were disillusioned that although ‘we did not even talk to anyone about what we don’t want here and there, a person just comes and invades your farm and they do as they wish’. So, jealousy and criminality crept in. The village was spared the gruesome beatings and murders suffered by other villages that had a conspicuous Congress presence.”

“For underground MK and PAC activists going into exile the presence of Bafurutshe in Botswana would be valuable. Bafurutshe had been crossing the border for decades, if not centuries, so they were familiar with the many routes that by-passed the border gates. ‘No I didn’t need a passport’, said one of the MK veterans. ‘We could walk into Ramotswa and do some shopping there on a Saturday morning on foot and back the same day again… So I was already used to crossing this border’. The intensity of the crossing in 1961-2 came occurred simultaneously with a change in laws controlling the movement of people in and out of the rural areas. The Zeerust area was subject to Government Notice 1268 of December 1961 enforcing these restrictions and tightening the granting of permits in what was described as areas of ‘unrest’. Perhaps an indication that the authorities had not discovered that the area was a route for recruits into MK, the Marico district in which Dinokana was located was exempted from the emergency measures.”

CHAPTER 4: RURAL RESISTANCE IN MPONDOLAND AND THEMBULAND: 1960 – 1963

This chapter, written by Sukude Matoti and Lungisile Ntsebeza, focuses on the reserve-based struggles of the early 1960s, more specifically the resistance in Mpondoland and Emigrant Thembuland in the Transkei. Some of the key questions that the chapter addresses are: What led to the resistance? What was the nature of the resistance? What role, if any, did political organisations play in the struggles? What methods and techniques of resistance were used? How did the state respond to the resistance? What lessons are to be learned from the struggles?

Excerpts

“Tribal Authorities were set up even in areas where there were no chiefs, a recognition on the part of the apartheid regime that rural areas were very uneven and not homogeneous. In these areas, Community Authorities, ruled by headmen, were established. By making chiefs central in apartheid administration in the rural areas of the former Bantustans, the Bantu Authorities Act thus represented one of the building blocks of the apartheid policy of consolidating the Bantustans. These Bantustans were later to become self-governing and, some, independent.”

“The revolt in Mpondoland was known as Intaba [the mountain] and Ikongo, and as Ikongo among the Xesibe in MT Ayliff. There are varying views about the origin of the name Ikongo. According to Mbeki (1984), the name is derived from the “Congress” of African National Congress. He therefore links it directly with the ANC. Slangwe, Gxabhu, and Mhlanga share this view. According to Mdingi and Ganyile, however, the term comes from the name Congo, in recognition of the 1960 revolt in Congo. Another interviewee from the region, F. Nxasana, supports this view. The latter position sounds plausible because if the name came from Congress it would have been Ikongolo, and not Ikongo. Compared to others in the country, this rural revolt was very well structured and organised. More about this aspect will come later.”

“Matters reached a boiling point and erupted into violence at a meeting that was called at the Isikelo Tribal Authority in March 1960. According to interviewees, Simon Silangwe, Gxabhu, Leonard Mdingi and Anderson Ganyile, what incensed the people most was the statement that Saul Mabude, a Councillor and Secretary to Sigcawu, made at a meeting at the Great Place of Chief Mhlabuvelile when people were refusing to accept the Bantu Authorities system. He is alleged to have said that the system would be forced upon the Mpondo people. His statement that ‘if an infant refuses to take food, the best option is always to force feed it (ukukakaza)’ was perceived as extremely offensive. They found it very insulting to be told that they would be force-fed the Bantu Authorities system like infants refusing to take food. At this meeting three councillors were physically attacked and forced to flee.”

“When tribal authorities were introduced, and Matanzima had given his full support for their establishment, the struggle for control of Emigrant Thembuland came up once again. Matanzima was adamant that Emigrant Thembuland was independent and that he was its paramount chief. He had even gone so far as to unilaterally call himself paramount chief. Although the Chief Magistrate and magistrates initially took Matanzima to task for referring to himself as Paramount chief, it is clear that by June 1956 the Chief Magistrate, at the very least, was changing his attitude towards Matanzima.”

CHAPTER 5: THE NATIONAL COMMITTEE OF LIBERATION (NCL)/AFRICAN RESISTANCE MOVEMENT (ARM)

One of the first organisations in South Africa to take the decision to use violent methods of struggle in the early 1960s was the National Liberation Committee (NLC), later renamed the African Resistance Movement (ARM). Magnus Gunther’s chapter takes us through the history of the NLC, from its humble beginnings under the leadership of Monty Berman and John Lang, through to the final betrayal by one of its leaders and ultimate dissolution. The analysis in Chapter 5 describes the antecedents and circumstances which led to the formation of this underground sabotage organisation; outlines the evolution of the NCL strategy and tactics on a year by year basis; compares what the NCL actually did by way of sabotage with what was done by the other major sabotage movement of the time, MK; and gives an overall appraisal by way of evaluating the assessments of previous critics and commentators. The chapter provides detailed insight into the activities of the only predominantly white organisation to turn to armed struggle in the 1960s.

Excerpts

“Berman founded the NCL. Lang operated as an autonomous associate but was to become a source of great frustration to his colleagues. The emergence of the NCL involved far more than this strange linkage between an ex-communist (albeit still closely connected with the Congress Movement) and an LP maverick. Five distinctive political tendencies were to come together to form this unusual anti-apartheid resistance grouping. In addition to the ex-communists, the NCL was to provide a domicile for dissident members of the Transvaal ANC Youth League (ANCYL); a small Trotskyist group called the Social League of Africa (SLA); a large number of

so-called Radical Liberals; and a ‘Gateskilite’ British businessman (Alex Cox) who had came back to South Africa to ‘fight apartheid’!”

“The dynamite permitted the NCL to make an approach to MK (Rusty Bernstein) and it was agreed to have a joint operation, with the NCL dynamiting a pylon in an industrial area while MK sabotaged a telephone sub-station. The dynamite blew the legs off two pylons but the wires, while damaged, still held it in position – the engineer who advised on how to pack the dynamite had failed to specify that a corner pylon was essential to bring the wires down. This was on December 20, 1961. By then something had happened to sour relations between MK and the NCL. The plan for a joint action had not materialised. On December 16, MK revealed its existence in a press statement which inter alia stated that they had no connection with a so-called NCL. The NCL people felt that the ‘MK operation had been mishandled’, and a rift developed which Berman later felt should ‘never have happened’ had it been handled with more sophistication. The details of this contretemps are unknown. However, it should be noted that while the NCL had reached out to MK it was the latter that emphatically slammed the door on cooperation.”

“The AFM [African Freedom Movement] grew out of dissent within the ANC during the period after the adoption of the Freedom Charter and the start of the Treason Trial when much of the senior leadership became partially immobilised. One result was that leadership at the provincial level deteriorated after 1956. This was especially so in the Transvaal where the authoritarian senescence of the ANC executive enraged a good part of the membership. The Transvaal leaderships’ incompetence and indifference to criticism led in 1958 to a ‘deeply shocking’ organisational shambles which ultimately required determined and heavy-handed national leadership intervention to bring to an end. In late 1957 the dissidents had organised themselves into a group of ‘Petitioners’ under the leadership of Stephen Sigale, who demanded an end to what they called ‘election rigging by machine politicians’ and a return to financial accountability and constitutionality.”

“Initially the National Committee was to have two sub-committees, one on matters political, the other on planning actions. In practice these functions became fused. Regional Committees did have these separate political and action sub-committees. There was to be no ‘leader’, but Hirson was appointed ‘correspondence secretary’ for the NCL. The meeting also seems to have agreed on Vigne’s stress on the need to start cautiously and build recruiting and expertise before making themselves known to the public. Those present constituted themselves the NC. Financing was to come from members giving a monthly subvention and (they hoped) from Lang and the London committee. They also agreed to help Sethlapelo go abroad for military training and to support his family while he was away (called Operation D). Finally, considerable time was spent on getting on the spot training from Berman’s anonymous ‘engineer’ in the use of explosives, detonators and timers.”

CHAPTER 6: THE PAC - WAR AGAINST THE STATE, 1960-1963

Brown Maaba examines the PAC’s militant activities in Langa and Nyanga in Cape Town, the Transkei and other parts of the eastern Cape where the organization had a presence. He demonstrates that though many of its activities were sporadic and ad hoc, they did however have an impact on the South African regime. In particular, the

apartheid regime, alarmed by PAC and Poqo activities in these regions, began to look apprehensively at 1963, the year planned for the PAC’s militant uprising. The narrative in this chapter highlights the development of strategy, the underground structures established, and the actions of some of these structures in various parts of the country.

Excerpts

“Though Sobukwe had talked about a liberated South Africa by 1963 it was left unexplained how this was to be achieved. After the PAC was banned a meeting was called in Port Elizabeth and attended by members from different regions and branches. John Nyathi Pokela argued that the time had come for the armed struggle to be waged. According to Mfanasekhaya Gqobose, then chairman of the Eastern Cape PAC region, the time had come to take up arms against the apartheid regime. His experience as one of the leading Africanists in the ANC had led him and others in the ANC to conclude that the authorities were unwilling to have a negotiated settlement on the future of the country. To the PAC a fertile ground existed for the turn to armed struggle.”

“At a secret meeting in Langa in 1961, Makwetu announced that new office bearers were to be elected in the region. The organization had been crippled by the sudden departure of some leaders to exile and the imprisonment of others. However, this decision also indicates that the PAC was still determined to take the struggle against apartheid forward. A decision was also made at this meeting to form substructures, which were to be followed by a vigorous recruiting process. A Task Force, which operated as some form of military and defense unit of Poqo, and was also called Lutsha, a Xhosa word for youth, was formed in Langa, accommodating members between 16 and 35.”

“On the 14th of April a battle was waged between the police and Poqo members at Mbekweni Location. The police had been tipped off about an impending attack on the black municipal staff at Mbekweni. A strong police patrol sent into the township came across a singing crowd of about 120 men, who attacked them, and wounded three, including the commanding officer. Contemporary reports, probably false, alleged that guns as well as sticks and stones were used. The police reacted by raiding the location with 162 constables and eight officers on 6 May, but could not ferret out suspects.”

“Between October and December 1962, actions were directed at Matanzima’s lieutenants. On 14th of October 1962, Poqo members murdered an advisor to Matanzima. On 23rd October there was an attempt to murder one of the chiefs in Cofimvaba, and on the 9th of December, Chief Mageza Dalasile was killed at Engcobo: these actions may or may not have involved Poqo members. In October 1962, Poqo members in Langa plotted the death of Matanzima himself. A car was organized and four men, Mkwane, Qudalele and two others travelled from Cape Town to the Transkei only to be intercepted by the police in Queenstown and charged for being in possession of dangerous weapons. The apartheid police tortured them. They finally broke and gave information about their comrades in Cape Town who were later arrested.”

“At Robben Island, the PAC prisoners who had been arrested prior to the uprising went ahead in April 1963 with the plan to liberate the country. To ensure the maximum impact, they convinced the common law prisoners to be part of the insurgency. One of the prisoners, Jeff Masemola, a skilled craftsman, produced a master key for the cells and another for the island’s arsenal. Another prisoner, Cedric Isaacs, assisted him in this task. The plan was to escape from Robben Island by boat, but it was foiled when a common law prisoner notified the prison warders. Just outside East London in Duncan Village, preparations were undermined from the beginning. One Poqo member, Mgaza, opened a garage in Duncan Village that was used to manufacture pangas for the planned revolt. He recalls, ‘The garage I had there in Duncan Village, that’s where we manufactured the armaments to go and fight the struggle and take the struggle to the white territory’. The workshop often closed at five in the afternoon and the PAC underground took charge in the evening to produce the pangas needed for the uprising. It was also planned to use the garage to manufacture guns. However this never came to fruition.”

CHAPTER 7: “WE ARE GOING TO KILL THE WHITES”: POQO/ PAN AFRICANIST CONGRESS STRUGGLES IN PRETORIA LOCATIONS, 1958-1964

Sello Mathebala’s chapter focuses on the development of PAC activities in the Pretoria region from 1959 to 1965. It concentrates on the growth of this organisation in Pretoria’s black townships of Lady Selbourne, Hebron, Atteridgeville, Mamelodi, Hammanskraal and Wallmansdal. It seeks to find answers to the following questions: why was the Pretoria region in the early 1960s dominated by PAC activities and who were the people most likely to join PAC, and why? It interrogates the differences in recruiting strategies between Mamelodi and Atteridgeville, despite frequent oscillation of members between these two places. It also attempts to explain why Poqo activities were more prevalent in this region than other regions in the Transvaal. And finally it points to the organisational failures of the PAC in Pretoria and how that led to the arrest of its Poqo members in 1963\64.

Excerpts

“Phil Tefu, who was a student at the time, knew about the existence of black political organisations such as the ANC, but was not in any way involved with politics. He admits that he did not know what the PAC’s modus operandi was until he joined the organisation in 1961. However, the forced removals of the late 1950s became a basis for discontent and created a fertile breeding ground for political organisations. For Phil Tefu, the relocation of people from the old locations to Mamelodi from 1958 onwards gave impetus to the development of black political organisations such as the PAC and ANC, which were previously concentrated in Lady Selbourne and Atteridgeville. Lady Selbourne was crucial to the PAC activities because of the presence of Lady Selbourne High School, which had politically active students from Atteridgeville. Phil Tefu also recalls people like Dr. Tsele and Stephen Tefu, who on several occasions converged on Paul Kruger’s Square to make political speeches. Though Tefu and many other young people would attend such meetings, they did not understand much of what was happening.”

“One other reason for the PAC’s success was that its leading figures were young and militant, which appealed to the youth. By contrast, the local ANC leadership was old and apparently out of touch. According to Fetanang Mohlala, the ANC in Pretoria was weakened by the PAC breakaway from the ANC in 1958, when militant ANC members from Pretoria defected to join the PAC and left older men like Mr. Lekgetho, Mr. Flevious Mareka, Stephen Tefu and Mr. Magano in the organization. By leaving the Pretoria leadership in the hands of the elderly the ANC left a vacuum that was to be filled by the emerging PAC/Poqo activists dominated by teachers and students in Pretoria’s schools. It is necessary, then, to discuss how this affected the development of political organisations in Pretoria’s township.”

“Tefu remembers being recruited by a certain Mr. Makhubela from Springs into the ranks of the PAC in 1961 and from then he went on a drive to recruit new members for the organization. Mamelodi and Atteridgeville differed in their political mobilisation strategies and recruiting criteria. The PAC in Atteridgeville seemed to have adhered to Sobukwe’s call that recruits should at least have a Standard Six. By contrast, the Mamelodi branch cast its recruitment net much wider by signing up as many young men as possible, including gangsters. This branch seems to have recruited young people regardless of their educational levels, arguing that Sobukwe himself interacted with the tsotsis in Soweto.”

“In both Atteridgeville and Mamelodi the leaders of the organisation were arrested on the evening of the 21st March 1963. In Mamelodi, Tefu remembers that the night before the arrest they held a meeting on a hill overlooking the township. During the meeting they noticed that there were police searchlights nearby. They decided to send Rocky Makapane (former gangster) and Percival Zulu (branch chairperson) to go and find out what the police wanted. But Tefu insists, ‘We actually wanted them to go and deal with them’. Nonetheless, the following morning, Tefu, Percival Zulu, Ananias Chiloane, Samuel Chibane, Isaac Mafatshe, Ephraim Bahula, Solomon Phetla, Nick Kekana, Neville Ncube and many others were arrested. Tefu concludes that the police might have been watching them for a while.”

CHAPTER 8: ‘LAND AND LIBERTY!’: THE AFRICAN PEOPLES’ DEMOCRATIC UNION OF SOUTHERN AFRICA DURING THE 1960S

APDUSA was established in 1961 as an affiliate of the Non-European Unity Movement (NEUM), which had been founded in December 1943 as an organization for national liberation by activists within the ‘Trotskyist’ tradition of the South African left. In Chapter 8 Robin Kayser and Mohamed Adhikari examine the history of this oganisation during the 1960s. APDUSA’S role has been overlooked both in general histories of South Africa and in accounts of the liberation struggle, partly because of the focus on the African National Congress and partly because of the secrecy with which APDUSA needed to operate. This chapter attempts to overcome this oversight by using private archives, unpublished manuscripts and interviews with APDUSA operatives to focus on themes and geographical areas neglected in South African historiography.

Excerpts

“APDUSA was constituted as a non-racial, unitary organization affiliated to the NEUM. The APDUSA constitution assigned central revolutionary significance to both the peasantry and the urban proletariat and set itself the task of serving as a conduit for channelling together the struggles of both the rural oppressed and the urban working classes within its organizational structures. The NEUM leadership intended, through APDUSA, to win mass support amongst rural dwellers with demands that restrictions on landholding be lifted and for a redistribution of land, as well as amongst the urban proletariat with its demand for democratic rights. Hence its slogan ‘Land and Liberty!’ Only as a broad-based mass movement, it was theorized, would APDUSA be in a position to direct their struggle towards the achievement of national liberation.”

“The NEUM leadership, moreover, was increasingly of the opinion that the emergence of pre-revolutionary conditions in South Africa called for a ‘new approach’ to the liberatory struggle. Because it interpreted the militancy of the Pondoland revolt and social unrest in the wake of Sharpeville as evidence ‘that the oppressed people of South Africa, in town and country, are morally and psychologically prepared to launch a sustained struggle for freedom by every means including military means’, the NEUM felt the time was ripe for it to resort to armed struggle.”

“Natal became a significant area of support for APDUSA with branches being formed in Pietermaritzburg, Durban and Dundee. The Pietermaritzburg branch was exceptionally successful in recruiting workers from the leather industry, one of the major economic activities in the city. Shaik Hassan, a leather worker and a member of the Pietermaritzburg Progressive Study Circle, an NEUM affiliate, emerged as one of the main leaders of a leather workers’ strike in the city in 1960. When he called upon Enver Hassim, Durban lawyer and NEUM executive member, to represent the strikers an opportunity was created to recruit many of these workers to the organization. The Pietermaritzburg branch with Hassan as chairman became one of APDUSA’s largest branches in the country. The Durban and Dundee branches were particularly successful in drawing support from younger activists who had been politicised through NEUM affiliated student and youth organizations such as the Society of Young Africa, the Durban Students Union and the Progressive Forum. The chairman of the Durban branch, Karrim Essack, a lawyer and NEUM executive member, built up a network of part-time and full-time organizers partly funded from his own pocket. Besides recruiting members and conducting meetings in Indian working class areas and African locations in and around Durban, these organizers also worked in the rural areas of Natal such as Ixopo, Bergville, Ladysmith, Izigolweni and even as far afield as eastern Pondoland in the Transkei. The Dundee branch also conducted conscientizing work in the rural areas of northern Natal.”

“The NEUM’s application for recognition as a liberatory organisation was turned down in early 1964 as were several subsequent appeals against this decision. The main reason put forward by the ALC [African Liberation Committee, a committee of the Organisation of African Unity responsible for supporting liberation struggles in those parts of the continent still under white or colonial rule] was that the NEUM and its activities ‘did not fall within the purview of its [the ALC’s] immediate charge of

decolonisation’. It was clear to the NEUM that the ALC had a narrow conception of the liberatory struggle as one merely for national independence but was not prepared to support the fight against neo-colonialism which was also anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist in nature. The consistent refusal of the ALC to recognise the NEUM as a liberatory organization became a major obstacle to the advancement of the NEUM’s cause, especially implementing the armed struggle. It meant that African states that were sympathetic towards the NEUM were reluctant to provide the organisation with assistance because they feared this would jeopardise their standing with the OAU. Recognition by the ALC would also have made it easier to obtain assistance from outside of Africa.”

CHAPTER 9: STATE REPRESSION IN THE 1960s

Consideration needs to taken not only of the activities of organisations, but also the repressive conditions under which they operated and the treatment of their members by the state. In Chapter 9 Madeleine Fullard examines the various legislative and institutional countermeasures developed by a state faced with sustained and evolving militant forms of opposition during the 1960s. The decade is shown as one in which the state used legislation to crush extra-parliamentary opposition while presenting an image of acting within ‘the rule of law’. Thus, we are given an account of the evolution of repressive legislation, such as the Sabotage Act, and its application against opposition organisations. Repressive legislation was accompanied by the abandonment of longstanding criminal procedures for those suspected of having committed political offences. These include extra-legal practices such as torture, deaths in detention, false testimony of accomplice witnesses in court cases, and harassment of political activists, while legislation was enacted to permit detention without trial, political executions, and the banning and banishment of individuals. Fullard makes use of various case studies and the experiences of a number of individuals to demonstrate the nature and effects of state repression. More importantly, her chapter gives new attention to the large numbers of political executions in the 1960s.

Excerpts

“The failure of the Treason Trial of 1956 to 1961 to achieve convictions against the Congress Alliance was a further incentive to develop new legislation to enable the police and judiciary to act against the opponents of the state unfettered by the liberal rules of law. The first half of the 1960s saw a dynamic interplay between the forms of resistance adopted by the liberation movements and legislation developed by the state to counteract them. There were several successive waves of different forms of protest activities, followed by hasty new legislation, followed by immediate (and sometimes retrospective) trials in terms of the new laws.”

“From 1962, the ANC and PAC had sent several hundred members into countries on the African continent and elsewhere to receive military training. When around one hundred persons were arrested along the Bechuanaland and Rhodesian borders, the state found itself unable to charge such persons with any offence aside from leaving the country without valid documentation, for which the penalty was a maximum of two years. Thus, in 1963 the state legislated the new offence of undergoing military

training with penalties similar to those of the offence of treason, and which could operate retrospectively. Some of those charged earlier were then retried and given heavy sentences. For example, Henry Fazzie, an ANC member from the Eastern Cape, was re-convicted with six others who were all given twenty year prison terms, reduced to twelve years on appeal. The following year, the offence was expanded to include recruitment and incitement, as well as undergoing military training inside South Africa. Prison sentences for these offences were generally between ten and twelve years. The Minister of Justice informed Parliament that by June 1965 133 persons had been arrested leaving to country in order to undergo military training and a further 88 had been arrested on their return from such training.”

“With the introduction of first the Ninety Day law and later the 180-day law, detainees consistently reported being tortured, particularly if suspected of involvement in acts of sabotage. This form of detention in itself constituted a form of ‘legal’ torture – the detainees were held incommunicado, often in solitary confinement, without access to lawyers or family. These conditions permitted wide scale abuses and torture. Between 1 May 1963 and 10 January 1965, 1095 people were detained under the Ninety Day law, of whom 575 were charged and 272 convicted.”

“Ngudle was found hanged in his cell on the night of the 4/5 September 1963. The family was not notified of the death for nearly two weeks and he was buried by the state after the District Surgeon conducted a post-mortem and found no evidence of ill-treatment or injuries on the body. His subsequent inquest cast the first light on the severe torture and conditions that the detainees experienced. It was also marked by secrecy, interference from the security police and a hostile judiciary. Joel Carlson, the lawyer briefed to represent the family, described the persistent devious efforts to undermine any gathering of information concerning his death. These ranged from the secret and rapid burial of Ngudle’s body in a pauper’s grave, the manipulation of court dates, and interference with the family. The state took the unprecedented step of posthumously banning Ngudle on 5 November 1963 during the inquest, in an effort to prevented the lawyers from presenting evidence from fellow detainees quoting Ngudle.”

Chapter 10: POLITICAL IMPRISONMENT AND RESISTANCE IN SOUTH AFRICA: THE CASE OF ROBBEN ISLAND, 1960-1970

Noel Solani and Noor Nieftagodien use the experiences of political prisoners on Robben Island as an example of political imprisonment in South Africa between 1960 and 1970 in Chapter 10. To understand political imprisonment the author takes us through the experiences of a few prisoners, whose accounts of the journey to Robben Island, their integration into prison life, relationship with common law prisoners and prisoners belonging to different political organisations, their daily routine and treatment by warders, their struggles for the right to education and other rights, and, in particular, how they managed to find ways to cope with prison life, point to a peculiar set of experiences that give us some insight to the contribution and sacrifices made by the country’s political prisoners, including many who followed the 1960s Robben Island generation.

Excerpts

“The banning of the major liberation movements in South Africa in the 1960s led to the detention and arrest of many activists. The first group of Umkhonto weSizwe and Poqo cadres were arrested in 1962 and were sentenced in 1963 to long terms of imprisonment at Robben Island, Kroonstad and Pretoria prisons. Despite being charged with the same offences and given similar sentences, political prisoners were sent to different prisons. The Nationalist government extended its racial segregation policies to the prisons. Most black male political prisoners were sent to Robben Island prison, while most white male political prisoners were sent to Pretoria prison. Black women were sent to Kroonstad prison and white women to Barberton. Robben Island prison became the focal point of South African imprisonment when the Rivonia group was sent there in June 1964. Pretoria prison achieved notoriety when high profile white activists, such as Denis Goldberg and Bram Fischer, were incarcerated there. Although Goldberg was sentenced with the other Rivonia Trialists, he was sent to Pretoria while his black comrades were all sent to Robben Island.”

“It is generally agreed that the most humiliating experience prisoners were subjected to on arrival at the prison was that of tauza. Warders forced prisoners to strip naked and ordered them to bend for the inspection of their anuses in order to check for any hidden objects. This offensive procedure was especially difficult for older men to endure. They were not accustomed to being naked in front of younger men. In many cultures, it is unthinkable that young men would be exposed to the private parts of the elders. Prisoners were also stripped of their names and only called by their numbers, thus inducing feelings of slavery, degradation and humiliation. This is one of the brutal ways in which the authorities demonstrated their power over those they kept captive.”

“Letter writing became one of the most important vehicles for informing families and relatives of their whereabouts. Moreover, in prison letter writing and visitors were the ‘life blood’ of prisoners. The Special Branch decided whether or not to give a letter to a particular prisoner. ‘Censored portions of letters would be sent on to the Commissioner of Prisons to provide political background [guidance], while some letters to and from prisoners containing supposedly political information would be withheld, examined and then retained in the prison records – revealing both the doggedness and the pettiness of the surveillance’.”

“But there developed a strong countervailing force to this sectarianism, which understood the importance of united action against a common enemy. Leaders from the PAC and ANC, as well other organisations such as the Unity Movement, worked relentlessly to forge unity among the political prisoner community. This unity, they argued, was not only vital but also did not mean that parties had to relinquish their political beliefs. Although the rivalry never disappeared, and sometimes even flared into physical fights, there was a growing recognition that fomenting divisions among people who had a common enemy was a futile exercise.”

CHAPTER 11: THE ANC IN EXILE: 1960-1970

Chapter 11, written by Sifiso Ndlovu, examines the experiences of the ANC in exile. The chapter first deals with journeys into exile of mainly ANC cadres, focusing on the routes taken, some of the hardships associated with the illegal movement into exile, and the difficult choices some had to make to go into exile. The second, section 2, is a study of the ways the ANC established itself in exile. The areas dealt with here include the establishment of an ANC presence in countries in Africa, Europe, particularly Britain, and elsewhere during the 1960s; the establishment of the External Mission-in-Exile in Tanzania; the manner in which the ANC Mission-in-Exile dealt with the lack of a formal decision to turn to armed struggle; the experiences of military training abroad of some MK cadres; life in MK’s first military camp at Kongwa in Tanzania; the experiences of various sectors of the ANC community in exile, such as youth, students and women; and the various problems that plagued the ANC in exile throughout the 1960s, such as the nature of the organisational structure at home and abroad, the state of organisation of the liberation movement, the relationship between the ANC and other Alliance organisations abroad, and proposals for improved methods of struggle. Included in this section is the history of the South African United Front, an organisation of the PAC, ANC and the South West African National Union (SWANU).

Excerpts

“The Bechuanaland-based ANC activists soon established contact with the ANC head office in Johannesburg, principally with Joe Modise, a member of the MK underground. Fish Keitsing, a Bechuanaland-born ANC activist, became a key figure in the establishment of the ‘road to freedom’. He was born in 1919 of a peasant family, and came to South Africa at the age of twenty-three as a migrant worker. He became one of the original members of the African Mineworkers’ Union led by J.B. Marks. Keitsing joined the ANC in 1949 and became the leader of the Newclare Branch and its volunteer-in-chief during the 1952 Defiance Campaign. He was charged with others in the Treason Trial of 1956-1961 and was deported by Verwoerd to Bechuanaland [present day Botswana] in 1959. Before he left, Walter Sisulu asked him to look at the possibility of setting up a safe house in Lobatse. The large number of the ‘Zeerust/Dinokana’ refugees in Bechuanaland made it necessary for the ANC to set up a clandestine base in this protectorate. Later, Keitsing handled all exiles from the moment they arrived in Bechuanaland until he saw them off to Zambia (Northern Rhodesia), Tanganyika (Tanzania) and beyond.”

“An example of collaboration between Southern African security apparatuses occurred on 2 March 1963, when thirty-four South African students entering Zambia were apprehended by Northern Rhodesian Immigration Authorities, then still part of the Central African Federation. Those arrested were taken to the Southern Rhodesian town of Bulawayo, and handed over to the South African police. In a letter addressed to Kenneth Kaunda, then a Minister of Local Government, Tennyson Makiwane questioned the swiftness with which this happened and the decision taken by the white immigration officials to hand those arrested over to the South Africans instead of returning them to Bechuanaland.”

“The United Front was formed, firstly, to provide a voluntary structure within which the destructive political rivalry between the ANC and PAC could be healed. The existing rivalry undermined the effective functioning of both organisations in the

international arena. Secondly, since both organisations lacked adequate financial and human resources in exile, the United Front would allow them to combine and raise funds jointly. Thirdly, the United Front intended to isolate South Africa politically, economically and culturally from the international community.”

“By the end of 1963, the ANC’s National Executive Committee as constituted abroad following the imprisonment of much of the leadership consisted (amongst others) of Tambo as Deputy (and Acting) President, J.B. Marks as Director of Transport and Communication, Moses Kotane as Treasurer General, Duma Nokwe as Secretary General, Alfred Kgokong as Director of Publicity and Information, Mendi Msimang as Administrative Secretary, James Hadebe as Director of Youth and Student Affairs and Head of the Welfare Department, Joe Matthews, and Robert Resha as Head of Information Service and International Relations Division. Other NEC members who served as ANC representatives in various countries included Tennyson and Ambrose Makiwane, Mzwai Piliso, Joe Matlou and Johnny Makathini. In a letter addressed to Matthews in 1966, Tambo voiced the opinion that the present system, in which each representative office of the ANC was a kingdom unto itself, would jeopardise and undermine the liberation struggle. He lamented the fact that that in such a situation each leader ‘was bound by nothing except his own ideas and decisions’. It seems that the whole struggle to reconstitute the ANC in exile during the 1960s was a struggle to change this situation.”

“Mkwayi was also alerted to other disturbing features about the ANC’s operations in Tanzania. Before Mkwayi and Mabhida left London, Vella Pillay, the SACP representative in Europe, informed them that they had been waiting for a group of trade unionists who were scheduled to attend worker education programmes in Eastern Europe to arrive from South Africa. Pillay requested Mkwayi and Mabhida to investigate the problem on their arrival in Tanzania. It transpired that Tennyson Makiwane had informed the trade unionists who were already in Dar es Salaam that he was not responsible for their travel arrangements. This was because they were trade union people and he was solely responsible for ANC activists and MK cadres. In an effort to unravel the situation, Mkwayi and Mabhida went to Tennyson’s home where they found Ruth Makiwane, Tennyson’s wife. They enquired from Ruth whether there were any travel documents, visas and passport kept there by Tennyson. To their astonishment, they found stacks of visas and many other documents. Eventually, the trade unionists’ visas were sorted out and they immediately left for England.”

“In March 1966, [Barney] Desai unilaterally cut ties with the ANC. He dissolved the CPC [Coloured People’s Congress] and proclaimed that it had merged with the PAC. He asserted that the CPC was convinced that the PAC was the majority non-racial political organisation in South Africa. He also claimed that the PAC was the only organisation committed to a resolute struggle ‘to rid our struggle and our country of race divisions and race labels’. The Azania News, a PAC newsletter, reported that the merger was greeted with international acclaim ‘all over the world – in the African countries, the Scandinavian countries, the United Kingdom, etc., the merger had been acclaimed’. The British Sunday Times saw the merger as the ‘first attempt to build a unitary, non-racial movement’. An Azania News editorial also carried a caustic rebuttal to Nana Mahomo’s [the PAC representative in London] criticism of the merger. It portrayed Mahomo as an ‘imperialist agent and multi-racialist completely

cut off from the revolution’. His sin was to suggest, in a magazine called Crisis and Change which he edited, that it would have been better if the CPC dissolution and merger with the PAC had been announced in South Africa itself.”

“The MK cadres were divided into two. Mlangeni and Mthembu were trained in radio communication at Shen-Yon Military Academy in the north. Mkwayi, Mhlaba and the rest were based in Nanking and were trained by the Chinese in indigenous methods of conducting sabotage and guerrilla warfare. The Chinese were experts in the adaptation of indigenous methods to suit various military scenarios and did not use big guns and heavy artillery during the actual training. Instead, they employed sub-machine guns, and taught lessons on how to manufacture hand grenades by utilising easily available raw materials and abundant resources around the trainees’ environment. Part of Mkwayi’s military training also included training in manufacturing Molotov cocktails using local resources. Mkwayi observed that there were differences between the Chinese and the Russians methods. A sizeable number of MK cadres trained by the East Europeans attended courses on military hardware.”

“An official, handwritten MK report compiled on 23 April 1967 about existing conditions and problems in Kongwa identifies corporal punishment and ethnicity as the main problems. Apparently, corporal punishment was rife during the early days when Ambrose Makiwane was the camp commander. Makiwane would impose harsh corporal punishment on those MK cadres who went AWOL. This was cited as one of the reasons that led to the acute differences that arose between Makiwane and Joe Modise.”

CHAPTER 12: THE WANKIE AND SIPOLILO BATTLES

Chapter 12, written by Moses Ralinala, Jabulani Sithole, Greg Houston and Bernard Magubane, covers a number of areas in the discussion of Umkhonto we Sizwe’s first major military campaign in the Wankie and Sipolilo areas of then Rhodesia. The chapter deals with the factors leading to the decision by the ANC to undertake a campaign in Rhodesia, the formation of the ANC/Zimbabwe African Peoples Union (ZAPU) military alliance as a precursor to the campaign, the preparations, crossing into Rhodesia, and engagements with the joint Rhodesian and South African forces in Wankie and the Rhodesian forces at Sipolilo, and the prison experiences of MK guerrillas who were captured in these battles.

Excerpts

“In 1966 many of the trained MK cadres were based at Kongwa, one of four ANC military bases in Tanzania. Recruits from South Africa also found their way to Kongwa where some of them were trained. It was here that MK cadres, especially those who were part of the first and second batches of recruits in the early 1960s, began to complain about the ANC leadership’s hesitation to send them back to South Africa to fight. Mavuso Msimang recalls that: ‘There was always an expectation that we were not going to stay in these places for very long. Nobody even brought suitcases, it would be these duffel bags … because the understanding was that the transit in Tanzania would be very, very brief. But we went to this camp in Kongwa – central Tanzania – and it became quite clear that … transition was going to take a

little longer. … People wanted to go home, and they just did not want to sit in Kongwa’. Nqose added, ‘I felt at the time that I could not just stay in Kongwa doing exercises without doing what I was trained for’.”

“Eric Mtshali, who was MK Chief of Personnel at the time, recalls that a consultative meeting was held in Zambia to discuss the issue of a joint operation with the ZAPU cadres. The idea of a joint operation was prompted by the fact that ZAPU was beginning to engage the Rhodesian regime militarily, and the ANC saw an opportune moment to mount a joint operation so that MK cadres could establish a route through Rhodesia to South Africa. Senior leaders of the ANC, including its Deputy President Oliver Tambo, its Secretary Duma Nokwe, its Treasurer-General Moses Kotane, and other leading members such as Tennyson Makiwane, Moses Mabhida and J.B. Marks crossed from Tanzania to Zambia for the meeting. The meeting, which was quite tense, took the whole day. At about five o’clock in the afternoon Tambo, who had done most of the talking, turned to Moses Mabhida and said: ‘All of us have spoken today Moses, but you have not said a word: what is your view on the matter?’ Mabhida simply said one word: ‘mayihlome! (the army must attack!)’. Tambo said: ‘Mabhida if you say we must go to war no one will oppose that.’ Mabhida was subsequently called Mayihlome in the ranks of MK.”

“The early detection of the unit was particularly surprising because of the strict precautions taken. The unit had discovered tyre tracks in the vicinity of their camp and was aware of the presence of the Rhodesian security forces. The guerrillas knew that the Rhodesian forces were more active during the day. In consequence they slept during the day in carefully concealed trenches and travelled at night. Other problems emerged as they moved deeper towards Matabeleland. They discovered that the terrain did not have any dense bush for cover. It also became difficult to shoot animals for food because the sound of shots would have alerted the enemy. Most of these problems were the result of poor preparation for the operation. One example was the use of old maps that were not accurate. The guerrillas had to rely on the stars to guide them.”

“There are several versions of the events leading to the first armed confrontation with the security forces. According to Thami Mali and Michele Berger, the members of the unit were tired and had been without food for almost eight days before the first battle. On 19 August they shared a small dove that Hani had killed earlier in the day. On the morning of 20 August the unit’s commander and commissar sent two cadres to go to a nearby river to hunt for meat. At about nine o’clock that morning spotter planes re-appeared above them. An hour later they heard the sounds of army trucks within a hundred metres of their camp. The Rhodesian army patrol was heading towards the nearby dam. Some hours later, at about three o’clock in the afternoon, there was an exchange of gunfire down by the river. Members of the unit felt sure that it involved their comrades who had been sent on the hunting expedition. The commanders of the unit began preparing a search team for the two men. But before they could dispatch the team to carry out this task Rhodesian forces attacked their camp, and the first military clash between the second unit and the Rhodesians ensued.”

CHAPTER 13: The ANC and the World, 1960-1970

In this chapter Sifiso Ndlovu deals with one of the most important pillars of the ANC’s strategy and tactics: its attempts to marshal international support for its struggle against apartheid. Included in this chapter is the history of the ANC’s foreign relations and the establishment and activities of its Information Service and International Relations Division (ISIRD). Sifiso also deals here with the history of the Anti-Apartheid Movement in the United Kingdom; and the historical relationship between the ANC and the United Nations; the ANC and the OAU; the ANC and the Eastern and Western Cold War blocs; and the ANC and the Churches during the decade under study.

Excerpts

“In December 1962, the London Committee of the ANC, formed in late ’61, established the Information Service and International Relations (ISIR) division, with staff and plans to campaign for the isolation of the apartheid regime. The ANC’s London Committee included, amongst others, Mazisi Kunene, Joe Matthews (after his relocation from Lesotho), Mendi Msimang and Tambo before the latter two moved to the ANC’s Tanzania headquarters in 1963. Since the founding of the United Nations and other relevant international organisations, the ANC had sent numerous delegations to present its cause in world forums: the UN, the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY), the Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF), the International Union of Students (IUS), and the International Labour Organisation (ILO). ANC members attended international forums that included the Bandung Conference, the Afro-Asian Solidarity Conference, and the African Peoples Conference, to name a few. Despite some small successes, there was still no organised contact worth mentioning in the United States, Canada, Latin America, the European continent and Asia. The ISIR division was meant to formalise and expand what scattered contacts there were throughout the world.”

“Not all African countries agreed with the OAU policy towards South Africa. For example, throughout the 1960s Malawi, led by Hastings Banda, adopted a formal policy of rapprochement with the South African government. It was Banda’s attitude that ‘African states north of the Zambezi must stop thinking that they can solve the problems of South Africa by shouts and threats in Addis Ababa, London or New York’. In 1969 Banda still defended Malawi’s relations with both South Africa and Portugal. He ridiculed those who shouted about South Africa yet had never been there, and dismissed members of the various liberation movements as professional refugees.”

“Abdul Minty remembers that soon after the announcement of the formation of the Boycott Movement, the South Africa Foundation was set up by both the South African government and private sector with a capital sum of 260 000 pounds. This was a princely sum considering that their opponents, the Boycott Movement, had very meagre resources with, ‘no budget, not even of five or ten shillings’ when it was established in 1959. The British government welcomed the formation of organisations like the South Africa Foundation in order to protect its interests as the largest investor in South Africa and also its major trading partner and source of all its military

equipment. The AAM had to counter very powerful vested interests and lobby groups, but the combination of reliable information, appropriate policy and mass mobilisation of the public created a formidable force.”

CHAPTER 14: THE MOROGORO CONFERENCE: A MOMENT OF SELF-REFLECTION

Nhlanhla Ndebele and Noor Nieftagodien use four key decisions taken at the Morogoro Conference – firstly to concentrate the alliance leadership in Africa; secondly, to trim the National Executive Committee (NEC) to promote efficiency; thirdly to create a Revolutionary Council to integrate both the political and military aspects of the struggle; and fourthly to create a restricted ANC membership for non-African alliance members in exile – and the issues giving rise to them as the basis to discuss the background and factors leading to the conference, and the conference proceedings. Therefore, the central focus in this chapter is, firstly, the reasons why, and the manner in which the ANC resolved to transform the NEC and to build a new leadership cadre, not only to replace those incarcerated, but also to deal with the internationalisation of the South African struggle; secondly, the reasons why, and how the ANC grappled with the question of integrating non-Africans into the organisation; and third, the reasons it was necessary to co-ordinate the political and military aspects of the struggle, such as the failures at Wankie, and how the ANC resolved this issue.

Excerpts

“The idea of holding a conference since the banning of the ANC in 1960 depended on a number of the issues, the first being the status of the external leadership vis-à-vis the internal leadership. The only time the ANC held a formal yet less of a constitutional conference was in 1962, in Botswana, and this meeting represented all leaders who were based in and outside South Africa. At the time it was not easy for the external leadership to formally constitute itself as a leadership structure partly because the leadership inside the country, though suppressed, still existed. Secondly the external leadership could not easily organize itself because this was a new terrain for the ANC, and it did not have visible and viable networks around the continent and the world at that time. Thirdly the relationship between the internal and external leadership was difficult precisely because of the South African government’s repression along the borders, and the difficult underground work demanded of a predominantly urban cadreship in either peri-urban or rural environments. Fourthly the globalisation of the South African struggle scattered all remaining and surviving ANC leaders all over the world.”

“In September 1965 Tambo attempted to deal with the concerns of non-Africans in exile. He asked Yusuf Dadoo (a renowned Indian leader and communist), Joe Slovo (a leading MK strategist and communist), and Joe Matthews (a leading member of the ANC and communist), to form a task committee to ‘draw up proposals relating to the strengthening of inter-Congress co-operation at all levels’. Their proposals included the formation of a ‘Council of War’ to co-ordinate the activities of Alliance members. The proposals were sent from London to the ANC’s headquarters in Dar es Salaam, ‘where they were shelved’. Around mid-1966 the task committee recommended that the ANC call a top-level meeting to address the Congress movement’s problems.”

“The conference was presided over by a number of the senior members, and JB Marks chaired it. Acknowledging the presence of elders, Matthews referred to Duma Nokwe, Johnny Makatini, and Moses Mabhida. Some of the papers at the Conference included a presentation by Duma Nokwe on International Affairs, Joe Matthews’s paper on A Commentary on the Freedom Charter, and a chart on how the ANC should be re-organized as the organization moved away from solidarity activity to become an effective liberation movement in exile. Joe Slovo prepared a document called Strategy and Tactics, which later informed most of the ANC’s modus operandi in exile. Matthews suggested that the initial draft was riddled with mistakes, and he, together with Nokwe, proposed certain changes to it.”

“The idea of promoting young cadres into the senior ANC organs originated before the conference, but OR was keen to consider the idea at the conference. James April noted attempts to promote young cadres within MK into the NEC at the conference. ‘This has been OR’s wish to take identified young talent into senior positions within the movement. For instance, prior to the Wankie campaign Basil February was always admired by OR’, and his death during the campaign, perhaps, deprived him of an opportunity to become one of the young leaders at the conference. ‘Another noticeable relationship involved OR and a young Mavuso Msimang, in which the former recommended the latter to the NEC’. The next nomination was Chris Hani, but both names were not included in the final group that made up the NEC after the conference. According to Msimang, he declined the nomination because he took a ‘decision to go back to school and further my studies. It was difficult for me to see people preparing themselves for the future whilst I was concentrating solely on the movement. There were people that I thought were more capable than me and could do much better’. After Hani’s nomination, April suggests that ‘OR was still disillusioned with the memorandum and decided not to promote any young member to the NEC’.”

CHAPTER 15: The Post-Rivonia ANC/SACP underground

Gregory Houston’s chapter examines what survived of MK and the ANC and SACP underground inside the country in the years following the Rivonia arrests until 1970. The following core questions are investigated: what possibility was there for the maintenance and building of military and political underground structures against the surveillance of the South African police? What was the nature of the underground structures that were created, and were they merely localised or linked regionally and nationally? What activities did they engage in? Four key areas are examined: the reconstitution of the ANC by the National Secretariat and MK by the second National High Command; Bram Fischer’s attempt to resuscitate the underground; the SACP’s underground propaganda activists; and various internal ANC underground networks established during the second half of the decade.

Excerpts

“Women played a critical role in ensuring that the underground structures functioned effectively. Albertina Sisulu, Gertrude Shope, Greta Ncaphai, Hunadi Motsoaledi, Irene Mkwayi, Tiny Nokwe, June Mlangeni, Beauty Makgothi, Rita Ndzanga, Eufenia

Hlapane and others worked closely with some of the leaders who had not been arrested. These women performed various special roles, such as organising safe accommodation for those who were on the run, finding safe places for propaganda and publicity equipment, managing an elaborate communications system and courier network for the underground, and undertaking other routine political chores such as gathering information about, and attending to the welfare of victims of the struggle.”

“At the time, as we have already stated, the members of the first national High Command of MK were either in prison or in exile, while most of the regional commands had been depleted as a result of state repression. The second national High Command was established when Wilton Mkwayi was chosen to lead the command structure. Wilton Mkwayi was one of the 156 accused in the 1956-1961 Treason Trial who had inadvertently been released during the 1960 State of Emergency. Mkwayi left the country thereafter, received military training abroad and returned to participate in the MK sabotage campaign. On his return from military training abroad he lived at Rivonia, and served on the logistics committee of the first national command structure until the day of the Rivonia arrests in July 1963, when he managed to slip away during the confusion around the attempts to round up Govan Mbeki and the others. After the arrests he moved to Soweto, from where he conducted his work as commander-in-chief in the new national leadership of MK. This body included the SACP’s David Kitson and Lionel Gay, and Laloo Chiba of the SAIC [South African Indian Congress].”

“It is important to note, as well, that at the beginning of 1965 Bram Fischer, with the exception of Chief Albert Luthuli, was the only remaining leader of national note inside the country. From the early 1960s Fischer had had links with MK, the ANC, and the SACP, and played a central role in the activities of the underground in general. Bram’s underground work during 1965 becomes particularly significant for any plans the movement had to continue with its armed struggle: he was the only person inside the country who could lead the establishment of an underground network to provide support for returning guerrillas.”

“In mid-1966 a committee was established in the London office to deal with the home front from abroad. The committee comprised Dadoo as the chair and Joe Slovo as secretary, and included Ronnie Kasrils and Jack Hodgson. One of the tasks of this committee was to get propaganda into the country, and to recruit people who could do this work for the committee. In the same year the committee began recruiting and training young Communists as propaganda activists. Ronnie Kasrils recruited the first of these whilst he was a student at the London School of Economics in 1966. Initially the task of these recruits was to serve as couriers carrying propaganda material into South Africa. The London office would prepare suitcases with false bottoms and a combination of South African and foreign tourists began ferrying clandestine leaflets into the country. Use was also made of British dockworkers, who would stuff leaflets into the cargoes of ships destined for South African ports and factories.”

“The formation of the first underground cell of this network demonstrates one persistent characteristic of the struggle against white minority rule in South Africa – there were always people who felt that ‘something had to be done’, whatever the conditions or circumstances. A number of the older members had been active in the ANC underground in the early 1960s and continued their political work after the

Rivonia arrests. Samson Ndou, for example, became a member of the ANC underground in 1961 and, after being introduced to Lawrence Ndzanga and Aaron Mahlangu by Elliot Shabangu, he participated with them in various underground structures from 1963 until they joined with Winnie in 1966. The younger members, such as Snuki Zikalala and Wally Serote, participated in informal political discussion groups before the formation of the underground network.”

CHAPTER 16: ABOVE-GROUND ACTIVITY IN THE 1960s

Resistance politics in South Africa during the 1960s was not restricted to the type of activities and the type of organisations mentioned above. After the banning of the liberation movements in April 1960 forced them underground, some opponents of apartheid continued their activities above ground within the country. As the decade progressed, the most prominent of these were various ‘liberal’ organisations, their members largely though by no means entirely white. These gained in prominence in the vacuum left by the banning of the ANC and the PAC and the suppression of associated organisations. Martin Legassick and Christopher Saunders deal with the contributions of individuals – such as Helen Suzman – various sectors of society – such as the press, lawyers, and students – and organisations – such as the Liberal Party, the Progressive Party, the Black Sash, the National Union of South African Students, and the Coloured Labour Party – to internal resistance during the decade. Above-ground activity by predominantly white liberals had its limitations, which are dealt with in some detail here. It is important to acknowledge, however, that the activities of the large numbers of people who opposed apartheid without joining any of the underground movements during the decade involved considerable sacrifice.

Excerpts

“The conflict between mainly white communists and anti-communists – despite their agreement at the horror of apartheid – constituted an unnecessary division in the movement for liberation. In fact, by the end of the 1960s this issue had largely disappeared. In South Africa itself, the lines between liberals and communists became blurred, as liberals participated in violence, and communists upheld democratic rights. The war against the Vietnamese people waged by the United States began to refocus attention, particularly among the youth, away from ‘East-West’ issues to ‘North-South’ issues. By 1970 the ground had been prepared, at least among white South African students, for the emergence not merely of pro-liberation movement but of (democratic) neo-Marxist ideas.”

“Some exceptional individuals carried on the work of other Congress organisations within the country, such as Fatima Meer that of the NIC [Natal Indian Congress] and Helen Joseph that of COD [Congress of Democrats]. Joseph, who was elected National Vice-President of COD before it was banned in September 1962, became the first person to be put under house arrest, in part for having travelled around the country to visit banished people, about whom she published a book in 1966. But even while banned and house-arrested she retained contacts with others in the Congress movement.”

“There was an uneven anti-communism in the Liberal Party. One of its leading African members, Jordan Ngubane, matched Duncan in his opposition: communism’s basic weakness, he wrote, was that it ‘elevated dogma into a prison of the mind’; the ANC spoke for the majority but had been ‘demoted to the status of a minority organisation’ by the communists in the Congress Alliance who were the ‘enemy of African nationalism’ and ‘sabotaged the African’s road to freedom’. Others, like Alan Paton and Dot Cleminshaw were far more tolerant of the communists. In the 1960s many younger party members urged a social democratic welfare-state program, and this was adopted in 1964.”

“Mrs Suzman played an active role inside and outside Parliament, and in this continued the tradition of the ‘Natives Representatives’. Her origins were in the upwardly mobile Jewish petty-bourgeoisie as it entered manufacturing to assimilate with the South African English, and her appeal lay in the wealthy suburbs of white English-speaking South Africa. She was part of a class and generation that had anticipated the steady liberalisation of race relations as a result of economic growth and education, and stood aghast at the 1948 victory of the NP, and even more at the 1960s confrontation of white terror and black ‘terrorism’ and at the demented fervour with which racial separation was being pursued. Her criticism was conducted with the discreet charm of the bourgeoisie, calling for the game to be played according to the rules.”