Joseph Nduli and Cleophas Ndlovu Abducted on the SA-Swaziland Border

Joseph Nduli and Cleophas Ndlovu Abducted on the SA-Swaziland Border

In the evening of 25 March 1976, precisely fifty years ago, apartheid Security Branch Major Jacobus de Swardt was leading a section of nine police officers who had accompanied Samson Lukhele to the crossing point in the Pongola-Piet Retief Road, where “illicit” border crossings were taking place. After waiting for a few hours, they decided that nothing was going to take place that night, and they opted to go home.

Just as soon as they were getting out of the bush towards the Kombi they were travelling in, they saw a torch light flashing twice and they decided to stop a few hundred metres beyond the bridge. The time was approximately 20:30, when Joseph “Mpisi” Nduli and Cleophas Melayibone “Gash” Ndlovu were approaching the bridge from the bush on the Swaziland side of the border. De Swardt’s team then got into the Kombi and travelled back to the signboard next to the bridge, with the park lights on.

At that time Samson Lukhele tried to make contact again by striking a match. When Nduli saw the match-light, he told Ndlovu, “Oh, it is Lukhele”. At a closer distance Joseph Nduli called out “Mbuzi-Mbuzi”, the agreed signal, and a voice answered “Ja”. Lukhele then approached Nduli and Ndlovu and asked why they were so late. Nduli responded that they had lost their way and he then introduced Ndlovu to Lukhele. Lukhele then left them and returned to the Kombi to converse with the policemen inside, who afterwards poured out the vehicle and pounced on Nduli and Ndlovu.

As Lieutenants Fourie and Winter grabbed the two, they began fighting back, particularly when they tried to bind their hands with a rope. Nduli cried and out and struggled furiously, but was overpowered, when a rope was tied tightly around his neck, and his hands were fixed behind his back. Ultimately, to block his screaming, one of the lieutenants pushed a handkerchief into his mouth.

Meanwhile Ndlovu was fighting with another policeman, Mngadi, who was trying to place a rope around his neck; and managed to bite Mngadi’s neck. Finally, Ndlovu was overwhelmed by other policemen who came to Mngadi’s assistance, and they forcibly loaded him into the Kombi, which was driven away while both men were blindfolded.

Samson Lukhele, who betrayed Nduli and Ndlovu, was arrested by the apartheid South African Police on 19 March 1976, after transporting seven Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) recruits, who crossed the border the day before his arrest. He had been approached by Jacob Zuma, in February 1976, at his home in Mahlabathini, in the depths of Zululand, in Natal, seeking him to use his Volkswagen 75 Kombi to transport people from Durban to Swaziland. The trip was to be facilitated by Joseph Mdluli (aka “Mkhuthuzi”) in Durban, and the passengers were to be received by Jacob Zuma at the Swaziland border.

When Zuma introduced Nduli to Lukhele, he mentioned his combat name “Alfred Ngwane”, who was also from Natal, but was at that time working in Swaziland. Joseph Nduli, affectionately known as Mpisi, played a vital role in establishing links with the Swaziland network of the exiled African National Congress (ANC). He was one of the first generation of MK combatants and was part of the Luthuli Detachment. He was trained in the Soviet Union and had lived in Tanzania. Nduli had previously fought against Rhodesian forces in the Wankie Campaign with the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) and was the only one who succeeded in crossing into South Africa, going as far as Natal, thereafter operating underground between Swaziland and South Africa.

The night before Lukhele’s arrest, Joseph “Mkhuthuzi” Mdluli was arrested by the Security Branch policemen at his Lamontville home, near Durban. On 19 March 1976, a day after his arrest, the security policemen arrived at Mdluli’s home to tell his wife Lydia that her husband had died in police custody. On 22 March, following some of the recruits escaping from Albert Dhlomo’s safe house to the nearest police station in Fairview, Swaziland, Jacob Zuma was arrested by the Swazi Police. Later that evening, Albert Dhlomo, was also arrested.

The following day, 23 March, on the roadside between Manzini and the Mozambique border, Thabo Mbeki was similarly arrested. Following their arrest on 25 March 1976, Joseph Nduli and Cleophas Ndlovu were terribly tortured by the apartheid Security Branch, who wanted information on the underground structures in Natal. Cleophas Ndlovu, together with Jethro Ndlovu and James Ngwenya, were drawn into the second regional of MK command in Natal, when the new National High Command was able to re-establish regional commands following the Rivonia arrests.

Actually, the torture was so intense that they were even close to losing their lives, like their comrade, “Mkhuthuzi” Mdluli who died in police custody in Durban. Former apartheid security police officer, Colonel ARC Taylor applied for amnesty for the abduction and torture of Joseph Nduli and Cleopas Ndlovu, both of whom were later accused in the 1976 Gwala or the “Pietermaritzburg Ten” treason trial. Taylor stated that Ndlovu and Nduli were abducted by members of the Security Branch and the Riot Unit at the Swaziland border and taken to a base at Island Rock. According to Taylor, Ndlovu and Nduli were assaulted with open hands and fists and one of them was kicked. They were also deprived of sleep.

With the assistance of Amnesty International, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) obtained statements taken from Nduli and Ndlovu in exile by the United Nations, in which they alleged that after they were abducted from Swaziland on 25 March 1976 by apartheid Durban Security Branch members, they were taken to Island Rock, Sodwana Bay, for questioning. In their statements, they maintained that they were both severely tortured, with Nduli saying that he was immersed in the sea, subjected to electric shocks while being suspended from the neck and beaten. Ndlovu also complained that he was blindfolded for thirteen days while his neck and wrists were tied with a rope. He was made to stand for long hours and subjected to countless electric shocks.

The interrogation of Lukhele and Joseph Nduli uncovered the network of Harry Gwala and Jacob Zuma. In addition, while under interrogation, the apartheid Security Branch found a document on Joseph Nduli, which mentioned the names of Kgalema Motlanthe and Stanley Nkosi, as those responsible for recruiting in Johannesburg. Subsequently, Motlanthe and Nkosi were interrogated in Johannesburg, arrested in 1976, and sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment on Robben Island.

The apartheid Special Branch had assembled a team of senior officers from Natal and Johannesburg to detain all those suspected of being involved in the Gwala and Jacob Zuma network. Zuma managed to escape the county in December 1975. By end of February 1976, the Security Branch had detained over 50 people it suspected of involvement. Even though Jacob Zuma had left the country, the Special Branch was still determined to detain Joseph Nduli and Cleophas Ndhlovu, despite the fact that they were residents of Swaziland, having been given political asylum by the Swazi Kingdom. Notwithstanding the confirmation by Swazi authorities that both Joseph Nduli and Cleopas Ndhlovu had been granted political asylum in the Kingdom, the application was dismissed by the court.

After the arrest of Joseph Nduli and Cleophas Ndhlovu, the state consolidated its charge sheet and issued an indictment with Gwala as accused number one. All ten accused were held incommunicado for the duration of their detention until they were brought before the court on 14 May 1976. By refusing to grant bail and detaining the accused in various police cells and in police stations far removed from their families, the state was trying to mitigate the risk of the accused presenting a unified, well considered legal defence. After several postponements due to the reluctance of the Security Branch to provide statements of the accused to the defence team, the trial started in August 1976.

Sources:
South African History Archives (SAHA).
South African History Online (SAHO).
Hugh Macmillan, “The Lusaka Years: The ANC in Exile in Zambia 1963 to 1994”, Jacana, 2013.
Thula Simpson, “Umkhonto we Sizwe: The ANC’s Armed Struggle”, Penguin, 2016.
Gregory Houston, “The Post-Rivonia ANC and the SACP Underground”, Human Sciences Research Council, January 2004.
Mxolisi Dlamuka, “Harry Gwala, Political Militancy and State Trials, 1960 – 1977”, University of the Western Cape History Department, 1990.
Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), “State and Allied Groupings: Torture in Custody”, TRC Final Report, Vol. 3, Chapter 3.

Castro Khwela
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