Nearly 41 years after anti-apartheid student activist Bathandwa Ndondo was killed, the first witnesses in the long-awaited murder trial testified on Monday, with one describing how he believed the notorious Transkei Security Branch was responsible for his death.
Former security branch constable Gcinisiko Dandala, 68, who is charged with Ndondo’s 1985 murder, appeared before judge Mbulelo Jolwana in the Mthatha High Court, sitting at the Cacadu Magistrate’s Court.
He pleaded not guilty.
Professor Lungisile Ntsebeza told the court Ndondo had been staying at his home in Cala after being expelled from the University of Transkei in 1984, along with fellow activist Thobile Bam.
On the day of Ndondo’s death in September 1985, Ntsebeza said, he had left him at home with Bam and Victor Ngaleka.
Later that day, Ngaleka and Bam stopped him on the road and informed him Ndondo had been taken to hospital after being arrested by the police’s security branch.
“They were adamant that Bathandwa was apprehended by the security branch,” Ntsebeza testified.
He said they first went to his bookshop to try to phone his older brother, advocate Dumisa Ntsebeza, but were unable to get through.
A man identified as Bhulwana, who has since died, then arrived and said he had witnessed the shooting of Ndondo.
“He was very clear that Bathandwa would never survive,” Ntsebeza said.
He rushed to Cala General Hospital, where he found Ndondo’s body.
“I opened the door. Staring at me was the corpse of Bathandwa lying on his back with a bandage tied around his chin to the top of his head.
“At the time he was naked, only wearing underwear.
“There was nothing visible except some spots which I later thought were bullet wounds.”
He said the experience became even more traumatic when a nurse turned the body over.
“As he was turning him, clots and clots of blood fell.”
Ntsebeza told the court the killing occurred during one of apartheid’s most repressive periods.
“The period we are dealing with was characterised by repression.
“The security branch was not only arresting people but also killing them.
“People disappeared like the Pebco Three.
“Before Bathandwa’s murder, the Cradock Four had also been killed.”
Fearing for his own life, he said he decided to share what he knew about the killing of Ndondo.
“I was conscious that at any time I could be killed. Whatever information I had I should share.”
He said he contacted a trusted journalist at Capital Radio in Port St Johns and later reported the matter to the Cala police station.
When he returned to the station later that day, he allegedly overheard the station commander, a Captain Jilili, telling another officer over the phone that “Mose” had reported that he had shot Ndondo.
Mose was reportedly an “askari” working for the security branch.
“I understood him to mean the police who took him from my house killed him,” Ntsebeza said.
He said his family arranged for an independent postmortem to be conducted by a Dr Botha because they did not want to rely solely on the state’s findings.
“We needed our own pathologist and not rely on the state’s doctor.”
Ngaleka also testified.
He said Ndondo had been elected SRC deputy president in 1983 and had been living at the Ntsebeza home when he arrived there in April 1985.
On the morning of September 24, Ngaleka left for a learner’s licence appointment and encountered a man walking from a kombi parked outside the house.
The man asked where Ndondo was.
Later that morning, Bam had informed him another man had also come looking for Ndondo.
As they headed towards the police station, they were stopped by a man named Silwana, who told them Ndondo had been shot and taken to Cala Hospital.
At the hospital, Ngaleka recognised the same kombi he had seen earlier outside the Ntsebeza home.
He approached the men standing beside it.
“The person I saw in the morning introduced himself as Mr Dandala,” Ngaleka testified.
He said he also recognised station commander Jilili.
“I looked around the kombi to see if Bathandwa was inside. He was not. I noticed blood on the seats and floor.
“The guy who seemed to be in charge also had blood on his shirt.”
He said he was told Ndondo had been detained before he left.
Police only took his statement in November 1985, he testified, and he was never asked to participate in an identification parade.
Retired Lieutenant-Colonel David Mvuyiswa Numa, who was a sergeant attached to the security police in 1985, told the court two SAP officers arrived at his office looking for Ndondo.
“They wanted me to accompany them to look for him.
“They never told me why they were looking for him. They said they wanted to detain him.”
Numa said he declined because he was alone in the office.
He could no longer identify the officers after all these years.
Three more state witnesses are expected to testify on Tuesday.
The state is attempting to secure the attendance of Eugene de Kock, the former commander of the apartheid-era police counterinsurgency unit C10 at Vlakplaas, outside Pretoria, who has not yet been traced.
Daily Dispatch
