The Pretoria-Based Moses Mabhida Unit

The Pretoria-Based Moses Mabhida Unit

In the early evening of 15 April 1988, Odirile Meshack Maponya (aka “Mainstay Chibuku”) was driven by Peter Maluleka through central Pretoria, and they stopped on the corner of Beatrix and Church Streets. Maponya got out and Maluleka drove on towards Van der Walt Street. At around 19:30, when Maponya was a few metres in-front of the Sterland Cinema Complex, which is on the corner of Beatrix and Pretorius Streets, a bomb exploded in his hands, killing him instantly.

Although a car that was parked on the street was destroyed by the explosion, a woman who was passing-by received minor injuries, and the cinema complex was left wholly undamaged. When Maluleka heard the blast, he immediately drove back towards Beatrix Street and found the scene crowded with people. He then proceeded in the direction of Church Street, and parked in front of the Van Aswegen shop, where he placed a limpet mine of the verge of the pavement. The limpet mine exploded at about 19:45, causing some windows to break-in and resulted in slight damages on nearby properties. In this instance, there were no fatalities reported.

Meshack “Mainstay” Maponya and Rodney “Baduza” Toka had entered the country from Botswana on 2 July 1987, with Maponya being a Commander of an Umkhonto we Sizwe’s (MK) permanent internal structure to operate out of Pretoria’s satellite townships, primarily Atteridgeville. According to Toka, “When we entered the country, our mission from exile was simply a four worded mission, it was recruit, train, arm and lead our people to battle. That was our basic orders from exile.” Amongst the people that they recruited and trained in Atteridgeville, were Francis Pitsi, Ernest Ramadite, George Mathe, Johannes Maleka. In Mamelodi, they recruited and trained Peter Maluleka, Stanza Bopape, Reginald Legodi, Reuben Khotsa and James Kgase.

On 16 March 1988, they identified further targets that they needed to attack, particularly policemen that were notorious for petrol-bombing houses of Comrades in Atteridgeville and its vicinity. Maponya indicated that the approval for the attack was obtained from Naledi Molefe, the Unit’s external Commander, based in Botswana. The following day, Toka engaged his fellow MK operatives, George Mathe and Ernest Ramadite, giving them the location of the target and instructed them to attack it.

On 17 March 1988, Mathe, Ramadite and Francis Pitsi went to a tavern at No. 3 Mariana Street in Atteridgeville, where there were ten to twelve people scattered in clusters in the yard. Closest to them, was a table where four policemen were seated. The three operatives walked past them, and they then went to put on brown overalls and returned to the tavern. At a distance of about five metres, Pitsi began firing an AK-47 automatic rifle, where there were only three off-duty policemen remaining. All three of the policemen were killed instantly, their names being Barney Mope, Andrew Mphahlele and Nelson Phenyane. Unfortunately, during the shooting, Mathe, who had a Makarov pistol, incidentally fired a bullet through Pitsi’s right side when he began shooting. The three guerrillas then retreated from Mariana to Manaka Street, where they had their base.

On 28 March, following this attack, an apartheid South African Defence Force (SADF) Unit raided a house in Phiring, Gaborone’s Broadhurst Area, killing four people, three women and a South African man known as Charles Mokoena. Mokoena was actually Solomon Molefi, also known as “Paul Naledi” or “Naledi Molefe”, who was MK’s Regional Commander in Botswana, and Commander of the Atteridgeville Unit. This was the attack that prompted Mainstay Maponya to try and bomb the Sterland Cinema Complex in central Pretoria.

The sudden death of Mainstay Maponya, as the Commander of the “Moses Mabhida Unit”, did not demoralise the Atteridgeville Unit from continuing with their operations. On the morning of 26 May 1988, Mathe and Ramadite travelled from Atteridgeville to central Pretoria and they parted ways at the taxi rank. At about 12:57, an explosion occurred from an engine compartment of a white Renault that was parked outside a block of flats in Proes Street, approximately 100 metres from the corner of Potgieter Street.

Twenty minutes later, four females from the Pretoria City Council Library, who were standing outside the Juicy Lucy restaurant on the corner of Andries and Vermeulen Streets, where the offices of the Ministry of Finance and Trade and Industry, as well as apartheid SADF offices, were located, were injured by an unexpected explosion from a concrete flower pot on the street corner. These ladies included Ms Prinsloo, Mrs Ferreira and Mrs Claasen.

Mainstay Maponya operated and survived for three years inside the country, from 1985 to 1988, despite the existence of the Vlakplaas death-squads that were led by Eugene de Kock. When the Vlakplaas Unit became aware that Mainstay Maponya was inside the country, and particularly within the Pretoria vicinity, they arrested and detained Mainstay’s younger brother, Japie Maponya. Failing to locate his whereabouts, they decided to smuggle Japie across the Swaziland border, where De Kock brutally killed him with a spade.

Even after they killed his brother, Mainstay Maponya, continued to puzzle the apartheid security forces and even managed to train other several MK units inside the country, which included Stanza Bopape. The apartheid security police managed to detain Stanza Bopape in June 1988, and failing to get any cooperation from him two or three days after his arrest, they decided to murder him by electrocution, on 12 June 1988. His body was dumped in the crocodile-infested Komati River on the border of Mozambique and South Africa. On 4 July 1988, police told his parents that he had escaped from prison and had disappeared.

On 13 June 1988, Rodney “Baduza” Toka, Francis Pitsi, George Mathe and other members of the MK Moses Mabhida Unit in Atteridgeville were arrested. However, they did not stand trial, the trial was just in its initial stage, when they escaped from Modderbee prison. The entire nine escaped, including Toka, Francis Pitsi, Johannes Maleka, Ernest Ramadite, George Mathe, Joseph Nkosi, Reginald Legodi, Reuben Khotsa and James Kgase.

The Moses Mabhida unit “successfully opened reconnaissance routes from Botswana for ferrying both personnel and material, prepared dead letter boxes, trained and armed new units, i.e. Sigcwelegcwele, Dabulamanzi, Maqedindaba, Mavumengwana, Madinoga and Hintsa. Thus, after the Kabwe Conference in 1986, when Comrade OR Tambo, the Commander-in-Chief of MK finally issued his command to ‘advance, attack and give the enemy no quarter’, and the Moses Mabhida unit was equal to the challenge. The unit responded in the most appropriate and dramatic fashion. They engaged the enemy personnel and installations in more than twenty encounters, attacks in Pretoria and West Rand areas” (January B “Che” Masilela in Toka).

Sources:
Wikipedia.
South African History Online (SAHO).
Thula Simpson, “Umkhonto we Sizwe: The ANC’s Armed Struggle”, Penguin, 2016.
Rodney ‘Baduza’ Toka, “Escape from Modderbee: Unfinished Trial – 1990”, Bheki Zungu, 2012.
Stanley Manong, “If We Must Die: An Autobiography of a Former Commander of Umkhonto we Sizwe”, Nkululeko, 2015.

Castro Khwela
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