Mandela’s Release Accompanied by Fighting Between the UDF and Inkatha
On the morning of 14 February 1990, the Natal Witness newspaper estimated that fighting around Durban and Pietermaritzburg had resulted in the death of over fifty people in the forty-eight-hour period since the release of the leader of the African National Congress (ANC), Nelson Mandela, from prison. On 13 February, Herman Stadler, the South African Police’s Chief of Public Relations, made a statement to the journalists in Pretoria about a large number of reports that were received by the apartheid police regarding the fighting that “exploded” in Natal on Sunday, 11 February 1990, following Mandela’s release.
Questionably, the Chief of Police in KwaZulu Bantustan, Jack Buchner, told the reporters that the fighting and killings were triggered by the murder of two Inkatha members by a mob of United Democratic Front (UDF) supporters on Saturday, 10 February, before Mandela’s release. The murder, according to Buchner, sparked violence between the supporters of the two organisations, which left thousands homeless. It was obvious that this statement by Buchner was intended to defend the atrocious act that were committed by Inkatha vigilantes, as it did not make sense why UDF will begin attacking Inkatha following the release of their leader, Nelson Mandela.
One of the reasons advanced for this violence was that pro-apartheid government forces as well as members of the apartheid security estab
