APLA

They were legitimate targets of the struggle because they were occupying the very trophy for which war was all about, that is the land. Because when we say ‘we were conquered,’ what we mean is that our land was conquered and the land wasn’t conquered by the ghosts, by the spirits, invisible ...

... demonstration, just peaceful demonstrations that’s how you see how the police they come and answer with a bullet. // So even you as part of APLA you didn’t feel that the country was heading towards any kind of reconciliation process? Did you feel it was a necessary thing to go and ...

Hello. Thanks for joining tonight’s Special Report. The Truth Commission process this past week was dominated by the 1993 APLA attack on a pub in Cape Town and by a special hearing into the past role of the legal profession. Tonight we bring you the full drama of both these hearings as well as ...

manifestations. We make no apologies, we have nothing to hide. // But there was a wide expectation that the PAC should explain the brutal attacks by APLA on white civilians. // A new pattern arose in the 1990s where civilians within the white community were attacked. In the nature of guerrilla ...

Two previous APLA operations, the St James Church and the Heidelberg Tavern attacks, had raised several questions. Those questions came up yet again this week. When exactly did APLA suspend the armed struggle and what role did race play in the attacks?

... Police, the South African Defence Force, the Azanian People’s Liberation Army and Umkhonto we Sizwe. The Azanian People’s Liberation Army or APLA was the armed wing of the Pan Africanist Congress. APLA has been operating for decades, but it really only became well known in 1992 and 1993 ...

you forgive me at this point in time but I can ask for your forgiveness. // My name is Walter Tanda, I come from the Eastern Cape and am a member of APLA. I got instruction from the high commander of APLA. I didn’t kill your daughter because it was my decision. I am saying sorry and that ...

... heading is ‘Transkei: Military activities of the Azanian People’s Liberation Army.’ The document identifies places in the Transkei at which APLA guerrillas were trained and it names a number of them. One of the places identified in that document is the house of Dumisa Ntsebeza in Cala. ...

APLA as a unit, that is APLA high command, is shouldering responsibility of all the activities that took place since its inception in 1961 till the cut-off date that is May 1994.

APLA then was fighting, returning a bullet with a bullet, protecting the Africans in Azania and the PAC was busy using other tactics so that you people in the government could hear the cries of the children of Azania. If your ears couldn’t listen, APLA decided to take guns to open the ears that ...

... knows who the oppressor was. // And did the white man also include young women as well? // According to the education I received the battle APLA was lodging was fighting the oppressor. Who you were or what you were was irrelevant. If you’re an oppressor we would fight against you. // On ...

Eleven people were killed and more than sixty wounded. This week, these three young men, cadres from the PAC’s Azanian People’s Liberation Army, APLA applied for amnesty for what has become known as the St James massacre. Bassie Mkhumbuzi transported the weapons from the former Transkei for the ...

... trained in target shooting and in white schools there was a regimentation of the children to raise their awareness about the war. To that extend APLA realized that they were facing the whole white ...

... Now the four want amnesty for the murder and the robbery that took place that afternoon. They say they were simply carrying out orders from the APLA commander and that the murder and the robbery had a very specific political ...

... Special Report and we ask the question, can racism be a political motive for murder? We start in July of 1993 on Sunday evening the 25th. APLA gunmen burst into an evening service at St. James Church in Kenilworth, Cape Town. They lobbed two hand grenades into the back pews and sprayed ...

... what it means is that it’s not a bunch of ex soldiers getting together having a braaivleis and swopping bush stories. What it is, is SWAPO, ANC, APLA, Umkhonto we Sizwe, Koevoet, Recces, all the units, every single unit, everybody whoever was trained in any way militarily getting together and ...

Perhaps the most trying time for Ntsebeza was when he was accused of driving the car that took APLA cadres to their grim mission at the Heidelberg Tavern in 1993. Post-TRC life for Ntsebeza means going back to the things he loves doing most, his legal practice.

... coins. // The car was to be sold in Lesotho so that the money that we get from that should be used to buy arms in order to further the struggle for APLA. // So, the money remained with you, the clothing remained with you, the motorcar remained with you. What about the camera you stole? Where did ...

The APLA cadres maintain they were simply carrying out orders when they attacked the tavern. They say as soldiers they had no choice, but executed the attack with pride and in the knowledge that they were helping to fight the struggle against the oppressor.

... of Afrikaner farmers whose families were blown apart by senseless landmines planted by ANC cadres, of bombs that exploded in civilian areas and of APLA guerrillas who stormed into churches and bars and mowed down innocent ...