The Remarkable Bophuthatswana Insurrection

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 African Army, from 1976 to 1980, as well as Chief of the entire South African Defence (SADF) from 1980 to 1985.

However, after this meeting, on 9 March, the situation further deteriorated, as staff of the Bophuthatswana Broadcasting Corporation joined the ongoing civil service strike. They seized control of the radio and television facilities, and took Lucas Mangope’s son, Eddie Mangope, who was the Head of the Corporation, hostage. Meanwhile, students at Mmabatho University began boycotting classes in support of the civil service strike.

Reports of looting in Mmabatho were televised, as local business centres, such as the Mega City Shopping Complex in the town, were severely damaged due to raging fires. For Mangope, it was obvious that the BDF was not acting to curb the state of anarchy. He then made the decision to call for outside forces to help restore order

When the situation got worse on Thursday, 10 March, President Mangope was advised to leave Mmabatho for his own protection. He was promptly taken by helicopter at around 14:00 to safety in Motswedi, a village 44 km north-west of Zeerust. Following Mangope’s evacuation, later that afternoon, at around 15:33, a group of close to 200 anti-Mangope Bophuthatswana policemen presented a petition to the apartheid South African Ambassador to the Bantustan, Professor Tjaart van der Walt, calling for Bophuthatswana to be re-integrated into South Africa; including the full payment of their pension fund contributions; as well as the opportunity for Bophuthatswana residents to participate in the April elections.

Virtually law and order had broken down and the BDF was left with the responsibility of maintaining order. Furthermore, that afternoon, people were running around the streets of the Bophuthatswana townships, singing African National Congress (ANC) freedom songs, proclaiming the fall of Mangope’s administration in the Bantustan, while several buildings and shopping complexes were on fire.

As the protests escalated and increasing rumours of ANC supporters massing on Bophuthatswana’s borders, Mangope asked Viljoen and the Volksfront to immediately assist in keeping the peace. Paramilitary Afrikaner forces were hastily mobilised, under the command of retired apartheid SADF Colonel Jan Breytenbach, and led by Commandant Douw Steyn. A large Volksfront force was mustered at the Mmabatho Air Force Base early on 11 March 1994. Simultaneously, AWB paramilitaries were also mobilised from Ventersdorp, Witbank and Rustenburg and their largest contingents took up positions near Mafikeng and Rooigrond, while AWB leader Eugene Terre’Blanche and the Volksfront Commandant Douw Steyn had a meeting at the Mmabatho air base.

In Mafikeng and Mmabatho, several (estimated 42) civilians, including a black woman, 52-year-old Anna Nakedi, were killed by AWB forces, who fired upon looters and passersby alike. In response, the predominantly black BDF, angered by their white superiors’ inability to control the AWB gunmen, mutinied against their officers. They entered Mmabatho and Mafikeng in armoured vehicles, rounded up the AWB paramilitary forces, and ordered them to leave Bophuthatswana immediately.

At around noon, the AWB convoy began to withdraw from Mmabatho, leaving their Volksfront colleagues behind. As they drove through Mafikeng and downtown Mmabatho, some AWB members continued to shoot at black civilians in the street, killing at least two. Meanwhile, members of the Bophuthatswana police had set up an ambush, and they opened fire on the AWB convoy, killing one AWB member, Francois Alwyn Venter, and wounding eleven others. Although most of the AWB vehicles managed to escape, the last vehicle, a blue Mercedes-Benz, was left behind after at least eight bullets had smashed the windshield and flattened a tyre.

The blue Mercedes-Benz was stuck at a stop street near the Bophuthatswana Police Force (BPF) headquarters in Mmabatho, with three white men clad in AWB uniforms, who were later identified as Nicolaas Fourie, Alwyn Wolfaardt and Jacobus Stephanus Uys, on the ground alongside it. The driver, Fourie, was shot in the neck and died almost instantly; another passenger, Wolfaardt; in the arm and the remaining passenger, Uys, in the leg. When journalists attempted to communicate with them, it became clear that they were scared, as one lay on the ground with his face down, while the other lay against the rear wheel of the vehicle.

A moment later, a Bophuthatswana police official came to the scene, clad in green police fatigues, carrying an R4 rifle, and began asking the three AWB men where they were from. One of the men, Wolfaardt, responded that they were from Naaboomspruit, and they were invited to Mmabatho by the Bophuthatswana “State President” to restore law and order. While the police official, who was later confirmed to be Ontlametse Menyatsoe, was talking to the men, one of the wounded men moved his hand underneath his body, and this prompted Menyatsoe to open fire on all three of them at point-black range with his R4 rifle. After shooting them dead, he then went back to the yard of the police headquarters.

An hour and a half later, the three bodies were tossed by the officers into a van and were delivered to a cold storage room at a mental hospital, with journalists being invited along to witness the final humiliation. Immediately, after the incident, the BDF ordered the Afrikaner Volksfront to leave Mmabatho and Mafikeng. The Volksfront withdrew in a much more orderly fashion later that afternoon, which was escorted by a BDF team, to avoid any engagement with the general public. During their withdrawal, one Volksfront member, Francois Willem Jansen Van Rensburg, was shot dead by an unidentified member of the BDF.

1 500 apartheid SADF troops, under the command of General Johannes Geldenhuys, moved in to occupy Mmabatho and Mafikeng and to assume responsibility for security in the two towns, as the Volksfront and AWB completed their withdrawal. One squadron of Eland armoured vehicles as well as infantry mounted in Ratel fighting vehicles was deployed to Mmabatho. Geldenhuys’ orders were to disarm the BDF soldiers, and to ensure the safety of Mangope and the BDF Commander, Major General Jack Turner. The BDF soldiers, who were equipped with only small arms and were without senior leadership, surrendered their armaments almost immediately.

A few hours later, the government of Bophuthatswana was formally abolished by the apartheid South African government. Attempts were made by the then Chief of the apartheid SADF, General Georg Meiring, to put the SADF into deployment in order to reinstate Mangope to power. Meiring, according to Mac Maharaj, was in very close contact with Colonel Jan Breytenbach, the former Commander of the 32 Battalion, and General Constand Viljoen.

When this attempt was aborted, immediately after the incident, apartheid General Constand Viljoen resigned as co-leader of the Afrikaner Volksfront. Viljoen cited irreconcilable differences in the leadership of the organisation, and later confirmed the registration of a new party, the Freedom Front, which represented white conservatives.

The Bophuthatswana insurrection was a major political crisis which began after Lucas Mangope attempted to crush widespread labour unrest and popular demonstrations demanding the incorporation of the territory into South Africa pending non-racial elections during the course of the same year. Violent protests immediately broke out following Mangope’s announcement on 7 March 1994 that Bophuthatswana would boycott the South African general elections.

This was escalated by the arrival of right-wing Afrikaner right-wing militias seeking to preserve the Mangope government. The predominantly black Bophuthatswana Defence Force and police refused to cooperate with the white extremists and mutinied, they then forced the Afrikaner paramilitaries to leave Bophuthatswana. The apartheid South African Defence Force (SADF) entered Bophuthatswana and restored order on 12 March.

The Bophuthatswana insurrection highlighted the deep unpopularity of the Mangope government and the Bantustan system among most of its residents. It was remembered largely for the televised execution of three AWB militants by Menyatsoe, a black police officer. The event proved to be a public relations disaster for the AWB and demoralised the movement, which was then intent on preserving white supremacy and white minority rule in South Africa.

Following the remarkable insurrection, ANC President Nelson Mandela held a rally in the Bophuthatswana capital, Mmabatho, on 15 March 1994, which was attended by more than 50 000 people. Mandela praised members of the Bophuthatswana military and police, contending that “the white far-right were given a lesson by the Bophuthatswana Police and Defence Force which they will never forget. They were chased out and humiliated.” Moreover, Mandela said that the fall of Mangope’s Bantustan regime was supposed to serve as a warning to the other “toy tyrants” in the country that their time was also coming.

Sources:
Wikipedia.
South African History Online (SAHO).
South African History Archives (SAHA).
Africa Watch, “Out of Sight: The Misery in Bophuthatswana”, Africa Watch, 16, September 1991.
Paul Taylor, “Marchers Seeking Right to Vote Riot in S. African ‘Homeland’”, The Washington Post, 11 March 1994.
Bill Keller, “‘Absolute folly’ then death”, Baltimore Sun, 12 March 1994.
Bob Drogin, “Executions Underscore Bophuthatswana Chaos”, Los Angeles Times, 12 March 1994.
Amnesty International, “Securing the Peace: Issues of justice and accountability in the wake of the Bophuthatswana uprising”, Amnesty International, 29 March 1994.
Lesego Masemola, “Killer of 3 AWB men threatened”, Independent Online (IOL), 12 April 2010.
SAPA, “Witness to Bophuthatswana Uprising Weeps Before The TRC”, South African Press Association, 22 September 1998.
Thula Simpson, “Umkhonto we Sizwe: The ANC’s Armed Struggle”, Penguin, 2016.
Padraig O’Malley, “Mac Maharaj on the fall of Bophuthatswana”, The Nelson Mandela Foundation, https://omalley.nelsonmandela.org/index.php/site/q/03lv02039/04lv02133/05lv02157/06lv02166.htm

Castro Khwela
Good day fellow Compatriots!