The Remarkable Bophuthatswana Insurrection
On the morning of 12 March 1994, several news agencies reported on the events of the 11 March 1994, which referred to President Lucas Mangope having fled Mmabatho, the capital of the Bophuthatswana Bantustan. A report on 11 March 1994 revealed that General Steven Meninger, a leader of the right-wing Afrikaner Weerstandsbewiging (AWB), mentioned that they had between 4 000 and 5 000 members in Mmabatho, saying “Ons is op ń kafferskiet piekniek” (“We are on a kaffir-shooting picnic”).
Bophuthatswana President Mangope had, on 8 March 1994, invited the leader of the right-wing Afrikaner Volksfront, General Constand Viljoen, to a meeting of his ministers with the Bophuthatswana Defence Force (BDF), the Bantustan police and intelligence services. In this meeting, it was agreed that Viljoen would use Volksfront’s paramilitary forces to protect key locations in Bophuthatswana if the situation deteriorated. Parliament was also empowered to call on Viljoen’s assistance sooner in the case of a forcible re-integration.
During the meeting, Mangope initially made it clear, however, that he would not tolerate the Volksfront’s more extremist ally, the AWB, being present because he considered them to be a violent racist organisation. Viljoen was regarded by Mangope to be a more moderate white leader and was respected by the members of the BDF and the Bantustan police, as he was the former head of both the apartheid South Afric
