The SACP Electing for Training Abroad, the ANC Debating the Armed Option
On 1 July 1961, Tennyson Makiwane was conversing with Wilton Mkwayi and Moses Mabhida about the South African Communist Party’s (SACP) December 1960 decision to take steps to initiate the training and equipping of selected personnel in new methods of struggle and thus prepare the nucleus of an adequate apparatus to lead struggles of a more forcible and violent nature.
Accordingly, Mabhida and Mkwayi were to be sent to Prague, Czechoslovakia, for military training during the latter part of the year. One of them would have to undergo preparation in Tanganyika, and the Party had decided that Mkwayi was going to go first to receive training. Furthermore, Makiwane informed them that somebody from London was going to join them for the training.
On the same day, the SACP’s representative in Europe, Vella Pillay, who was based in London, approached Nandha Naidoo about the request for somebody to be sent to study radio technology and communication, thus be able to train others. According to Pillay, the course was intended to take three months, perhaps longer if needs be. Mac Maharaj was also going to undertake military training in East Germany while at the same time studying printing. When Naidoo agreed to be involved, Pillay told him that he was supposed to travel to Prague, where he was to meet Moses Mabhida and Milton Mkwayi, who would be in the Atlantic Hotel.
Meanwhile, on the same night, the
