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Biko’s imprisonment, death and its aftermath

In the wake of the urban revolt of 1976 and with the prospects of national revolution becoming increasingly real, security police detained Biko, the outspoken student leader, on August 18th. He was thirty years old and was reportedly extremely fit when arrested. He was detained in Port Elizabeth and on 11 September 1977, he was moved to Pretoria Central Prison, Transvaal (now Gauteng). On 12 September, he died in detention - the 20th person to have died in detention in the preceding eighteen months. A post-mortem was conducted the day after Biko’s death, at which his family was present. The explanation given by the Minister of Justice and Police, Jimmy Kruger, that Biko died while on a hunger strike was found wanting by many observers and people close to Biko. Medical reports received by Minister Kruger were not made public.

Because Biko was the twentieth person to die in police custody, a number of newspapers did their own private investigations and learned that Biko died from brain injuries. Their investigations also revealed that Biko was assaulted before he was transported to Pretoria without any medical attention. Three South African newspapers carried reports that Biko did not die as a result of a hunger strike. Kruger took one of these papers, the Rand Daily Mail to the South African Press Council to lodge a complaint after it had published a front-page story claiming that Steve Biko had suffered extensive brain damage. The Star, another daily press, came out in support of the Rand Daily Mail and pointed out that newspapers would continue to write about the circumstances surrounding Biko’s death because the police were found to be responsible for his death.

The World and Weekend World newspapers also continued to cover reports about the death of Biko. The two newspapers augmented earlier reports by pointing out that Biko was not the first person to die while in detention. Moreover, all these deaths happened under mysterious circumstances. In addition, the Johannesburg Sunday Express said that sources connected with the forensic investigation maintained that brain damage had been the cause of death. In Britain, it was learned from South African sources that fluid drawn from the victim’s spine revealed many red cells - an indication of brain damage.

A photograph of Biko lying in his coffin was taken secretly just before the funeral and sent by an underground South African source to Britain. This was seen as added proof that the anti-apartheid student activist had been beaten to death while in prison. Kruger claimed that he had never fired any police officer for brutality or any related misconduct and he strenuously denied the beating of Biko in an interview with the American Times magazine.

Biko’s brutal death made him a martyr in the history of Black resistance to white hegemony. It inflamed Black anger and inspired a rededication to the struggle for freedom. Progressive Federal Party parliamentarian, Helen Suzman, warned Minister of Justice, Jimmy Kruger, that 'The world was not going to forget the Biko affair,' adding, 'We will not forget it either.' Kruger’s reply that Biko’s death 'left him cold,' echoed around the world. A widespread crackdown on Black student organisations and political movements followed. Just before the Biko and deaths in detention inquest, police swooped on the remaining Black Consciousness resistance organisations. In the process, two of Biko’s White friends, the Reverend Beyers Naudé and Donald Woods were banned, and Percy Qoboza, editor of The World, was banned for allegedly writing exaggerated articles about the manner of Biko’s death. Prime Minister Vorster called a snap election and a large majority of white voters united in a call for Vorster’s Nationalist Government to remain in power to face the formidable challenge of a distinctly polarised Black population.

An international outcry and condemnation of South Africa’s security laws led directly to the West’s decision to support the United Nations (UN) Security Council vote to ban mandatory arms sales to South Africa (Resolution 418 of 4 November 1977). The South African problem had been on the international agenda almost from the start of the United Nations, and was acknowledged as an international 'problem' by the Western powers after Sharpeville in 1960. It was also kept on the agenda through sustained Afro-Asian diplomatic efforts, that were conducted under the auspices of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). Institutional pressure on the Western powers “to do something” about South Africa was intensified after the Soweto riots in 1976, and particularly following the death of Steve Biko, the Black Consciousness leader, in police custody. These events led to a new round of Security Council meetings and a mandatory arms embargo – the first time that action had been taken against South Africa under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter. Codes of conduct for Western businesses operating in South Africa were also introduced, thanks to revelations in a successful newspaper campaign in Britain that many Western businesses were profiting from apartheid by paying their workers below subsistence wages.

In South Africa, urban conditions for Blacks continued to deteriorate, as large numbers of impoverished Bantustan inhabitants – now ignored by the labour recruiters – bypassed influx control mechanisms put in place by apartheid in their desperate search for employment. Consequently, existing dwellings became grotesquely overcrowded as the state put a brake on the provision of new urban housing. This lead to the emergence of huge squatter settlements on the outskirts of the major cities. Transport deteriorated even further and discontent mounted among both workers and the unemployed. At the same time, the relative success of the workers’ strikes and other institutional shortcomings inspired the Black Consciousness Movement. The United States Congress also called for a probe into Biko’s death. The congress sent a letter of request to the South African Ambassador, Donald B Sole, in the USA. The letter requested that an international panel of experts be established to investigate the death of Biko. The letter’s demands were not limited to Biko’s death only. It also requested an investigation of South Africa’s detention practices. Moreover, the letter stated that the death of Biko put South Africa’s human rights record in the spotlight and would add to the country’s further isolation.

SASO, the South African Students’ Movement (SASM) and the Soweto Students’ Representative Council (SSRC) were no more by the end of 1977. The principal leaders were either in jail, in exile, or dead. The way was clear for the establishment of new movements drawing on the experiences of 1976. An immediate task was the construction of a new unifying ideology. Although many people were still nervous about political activity following the 1977 crackdown on BC organisations, the Azanian Peoples’ Organisation (AZAPO) was formed in 1978 as a successor to the proscribed Black Consciousness structures. It was an attempt at further espousing and re-inventing the Black Consciousness philosophy which Biko bequeathed to South Africa. It launched a student wing, the Azanian Students’ Organisation (AZASO), made up of university students. Clearly, AZAPO and AZASO were stepping into a new organisational vacuum in the townships created by the banning, first, of the ANC, PAC and finally the BCM and there was at this stage, no obvious conflict between the new groups and the ANC tradition. 

The Inquest into Biko's Death and his funeral:

Prior to Biko's inquest, magistrates had declined to examine the interrogation methods used and had attributed a number of detention deaths to natural causes, suicides or prison accidents. At the inquest into Biko’s death no government official was prepared to condemn the treatment meted out to the deceased. The circumstances of his death were said to be inconclusive and death was attributed to a 'prison accident.' Evidence presented during the 15-day inquest into Biko’s death revealed otherwise. During his detention in a Port Elizabeth prison cell he had been chained to a grill at night and left to lie in urine-soaked blankets. He had been stripped naked and kept in leg-irons for 48 hours in his cell. A blow in a scuffle with security police caused brain damage. He was then driven, in this state naked and manacled in the back of a police van to Pretoria, where, on 12 September 1977 he died.

BIko's his funeral was the first big political funeral in South Africa. As bus-loads of mourners neared Biko's burial town (King William’s Town), they passed Black youths standing solemnly along the road with their clenched fists raised. Prominent white liberals, such as the parliamentarian, Helen Suzman, attended. So did the black American diplomat, Donald McHenry and other international dignitaries. At the funeral, 20 000 people marched and sang freedom songs. For five hours, speakers eulogised Biko. The Rev, Xundu, the Transkei Anglican priest, who presided over the funeral, appealed to God to take sides with the oppressed to overthrow the system.

Two years later the South African Medical and Dental Council (SAMDC) disciplinary committee found there was no prima facie case against the two doctors who had treated Biko shortly before his death. Dissatisfied doctors presented a petition to the Council in February 1982 seeking another inquiry into the role of the medical authorities who had treated Biko shortly before his death. This was rejected on the grounds that no new evidence had come to light. Biko’s death caught the attention of the international community, which increased the pressure on the South African government to abolish its detention policies and called for an international probe on the causes of Biko's death. Even close allies of South Africa, Britain and the United States of America, expressed deep concern over the death of Biko.

It took eight years of intense pressure before the South African Medical Council took disciplinary action. On 30 January 1985, the Pretoria Supreme Court ordered the SAMDC to hold an inquiry into the conduct of the two doctors who treated Steve Biko for five days before he died. In judgment handed down Judge President of the Transvaal Justice W. G. Boshoff said that there was prima facie evidence of improper or disgraceful conduct on the part of the “Biko” doctors in a professional respect.

Sadly, Biko’s death did not put an end to the ill-treatment of prisoners. Years later, when young Dr Wendy Orr made her disclosures about the treatment of detainees in the Eastern Cape it became clear that conditions had changed very little. In September 1987 Helen Suzman once again produced claims of torture and ill-treatment in detention with thirty-seven signed affidavits. In 1997 Biko’s killers appeared before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to request amnesty for the death of the student leader. However, they only claimed responsibility for assaulting him and maintained that his death was accidental. They also testified that they lied about his date of death. The family of Biko opposed the TRC hearings on the grounds that they would rob them of justice. They accused Harold Synman, the policeman responsible for Biko’s death, of adding more lies to the circumstances surrounding Biko’s death.

Next: Conclusion & bibliography

on biko's death