TRC Final Report

Volume 3

Chapter 5

Subsection 28

Detentions

182 Most detentions prior to 1985 were under section 29¹⁷. One of the most widely publicised cases was the arrest and detention of Simonstown Naval Commander Dieter Gerhardt and his wife Ruth, pending their treason trial relating to spying activities for the USSR. They were later sentenced to life imprisonment.

183 On October 26 1985, the state of emergency was extended to the western Cape. Midnight raids during the night of 25/26 October resulted in mass detentions under section 50¹⁸, targeting predominantly the leaders of UDF affiliates. Sixty-six people were detained that night, and at least four hundred over the following two weeks.

184 The first state of emergency in the Western Cape lasted 132 days and approximately 1 300 people were detained, including teachers, clergy, journalists, attorneys, students, unemployed people and pensioners. More than fifty youth were included, some as young as eleven years of age. Most detainees were released by the end of December 1985, but several were subjected to restrictions on their movements and activities. Ongoing detentions occurred until the lifting of the state of emergency in March 1986, while section 29 detentions actually increased during the first six months of 1986.

185 The mass swoop was repeated in the early hours of 12 June 1986 with the declaration of a national state of emergency. Approximately 160 individuals were detained immediately and more over the next few weeks, including many of the people who had been detained in 1985. A non-governmental organisation (NGO) recorded 349 detentions in the urban Cape Town area over 1986. The majority of these detainees were released by the end of 1986. Among those detained were a Roman Catholic nun, an entire church congregation of 189 people in Elsies River, and Worcester UDF activist Christopher Tyawana, whose section 29 detention was brought about by a collaboration between the Security Branch and Allied Bank.

186 Detention became more selective in 1987–89 and often focused on events or campaigns undertaken by the opposition movement.

187 A small but significant group of leading activists were held for very lengthy periods, including Mr Trevor Manuel (held for 676 days), Mr Mziwonke ‘Whitey’ Jacobs (560 days), Mr Lizo Kapa (387 days), Mr Ebrahim Rassool (384 days) and Mr Naseegh Jaffer (351 days). Some activists experienced repeated detentions. Mr Willie Hofmeyr embarked on a twenty-eight-day hunger strike in 1989 during his third detention, after a six-month period in solitary confinement during 1988. Detainees were also served with restriction orders on their release, thus continuing their imprisonment beyond the confines of a jail.

188 Clusters of individuals were detained and later charged with public violence. A proliferation of public violence trials saw hundreds of young people sent to prisons along with common criminals for lengthy prison sentences. Many of the sentences were based on ‘confessions’ extracted under torture.