Bonteheuwel Military Wing

Bonteheuwel Military Wing (BMW)42 309 Bonteheuwel is a ‘coloured’ township that became known as a militant area in the second half of the 1980s, not least because of the activities of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing (BMW). The idea of forming “a militant body to co-ordinate and intensify the ...

■ APPENDIX THE BONTEHEUWEL MILITARY WING 1 Bonteheuwel is a coloured township situated north of Cape Town. It was created in the 1960s as a repository for coloured people who had been forced to move out of Cape Town as a result of the Group Areas Act. By the mid-1980s, it had become a site ...

... although we have in return received our freedom and our democracy in this country. But to what extent did we, as the comrades, members of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing gain? I do not think we have gained anything because we are still in the same position as we used to be -unemployed, ...

... 249 Chapter 9 SPECIAL HEARING: Children and Youth........................................ 250 Appendix: Case Study Bonteheuwel Military Wing ............................... 280 Chapter 10 SPECIAL HEARING: ...

... National Congress (ANC) and the United Democratic Front (UDF) in KwaZulu-Natal; apartheid as a crime against humanity; apartheid legislation; Bonteheuwel Military Wing; the Caprivi trainees (the Caprivi trainees, who were trained by the South African Defence Force (SADF) and deployed as a ...

... Investigation Units, particularly the one based at Gugulethu. The Athlone-based unit was involved in widespread torture of youth linked to the Bonteheuwel Military Wing (discussed below). Many of these individuals were forced to implicate themselves in confessions used later in efforts to ...

... bullet to the head that killed Mutsi. Mr Anton Fransch [CT00302, CT03204] was wanted by the police as a student activist and member of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing before leaving the country in September 1986 to be trained by the ANC in Angola. He died in a battle with security forces ...

... he was pursued by a group of youths. He fled into a nearby house where he was stoned, beaten and stabbed to death by a large group. A member of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing, Mr Colin de Souza [AM5377/97], has applied for amnesty for the killing. The UDF issued a statement after the killing ...

... withstand difficulties.” 75 Nevertheless, this strength could be a double-edged sword for the women concerned. Sandra Adonis, a member of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing, described at the children’s hearing in the Western Cape how she “was like trying to hit back at (the policeman) all ...

... Cape. 7 A similar pattern emerges for cases of severe ill treatment, with ANC, UDF and PAC members experiencing the bulk of the violations. (The Bonteheuwel Military Wing was an ANC-aligned organisation.) 8 The pattern of torture is no different. All torture victims were members of black ...

... who were in exile. 58 Fear of detention meant that many young activists were ‘on the run’ and ‘in hiding’. Sandra Adonis, a member of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing, lived ‘on the run’ until she was eventually captured by the security police: By the time they got hold of me, I knew ...

... on women, of whom two were activists and another had been caught in the crossfire. The hearing also highlighted violations committed against the Bonteheuwel Military Wing, the killing of the MK cadre Ashley Kriel and the Pollsmoor march. 1 This was verified in an amnesty application. ...

... of coloured militancy and participation in public as well as underground resistance activities. The semiundergound youth structure known as the Bonteheuwel Military Wing (BMW) is a particular manifestation of this. 102 Secondly, informal settlements in and around Cape Town’s formal black ...