(This photo of Mr Sam Kikine was taken a few years ago at a function at the Durban City Hall)
Researching through my
work at the Press Trust of SA News Agency in the 1980s, I found an
article on Mr Sam Kikine, a trade union leader who came under the scrutiny of
the former apartheid security police. He was charged with High Treason even though
the state did not have any evidence against him.
I am re-publishing this
article, STRANGE CASE OF SAM KIKINE, as
part of my Rich History series in order to highlight the humanitarian struggles
pre-1994.
Mr Kikine, who is now 73
years-old and resides in Durban, was a leader of the South African Allied Workers Union (SAAWU) at
that time in the 1980s and early 1990s.
THIS IS THE ARTICLE:
August 13 1982
STRANG CASE OF SAM KIKINE
Kikine
Mr Sam Kikine, a leading black South African trade
unionist, is a person who is not easily ruffled by the problems he encounters
in the course of his work but a current court action against him under the
country 's Terrorism Act leaves him dumfounded.
Mr Kikine, the
33-year-old secretary general of the 95 000-strong South African Allied Workers
Union(SAAWU), has already appeared four times in a Durban magistrates’ court
but the authorities have not yet specified the charges against him.
He is out on bail of
R500, the first time that a Terrorism Act accused has been allowed bail while
the authorities frame charges. Mr Kikine, who is based in the Durban office of
SAAWU ), was first brought to court with two other senior SAAWU
officials in Johannesburg on June 28 after being held in detention without
trial for eight months.
Kikine
was detained on November 27 1981 in Durban - two days after he played a leading
role in organising the funeral of Durban political trials lawyer, Griffith
Mxenge, who was brutally slain by people believed to be members of the white
right-wing.
Kikine, who is a popular personality
in the black community in Durban, was first held under the General Laws
Amendment Act which allows the authorities to detain a person incommunicado for
14 days. He was later transferred to Section 6 of the Terrorism Act.
In March this year he was taken to a Durban hospital
for psychiatric treatment and was held under police guard.
At the same time the president of SAAWU, Mr Thozamile Gqweta, was also admitted for psychiatric treatment at a Johannesburg hospital.
Sometime after his discharge from hospital, Mr Kikine was taken to Johannesburg
where on June 28 1982 he was charged with Mr Gqweta and another senior SAAWU
official, Mr Sisa Njikelane, in connection with charges under the Terrorism
Act.
Details of their charges
were not disclosed by the authorities. Mr Kikine was told that he would be transferred to Durban for trial
while his colleagues would be transferred to Grahamstown. But 30 minutes later he
was taken back to court and told that the charges against him had been withdrawn.
However, he was immediately re-detained and taken to
Durban under police escort. On June 29 he appeared in a Durban magistrates’
court court and told that he was facing charges in connection with the
Terrorism Act but no specific charges were preferred against him.
He was taken into police
custody once again and the authorities stated that he was being held under a
section of the Internal Security Act that did not allow for bail.
But his lawyers made a
successful bail application and on July 13 he was out on R500 bail. Since then
he has appeared twice in court but no specific charges were put to
him. Because Mr Kikine is facing trial, he declined
to grant the Press Trust of South Africa an interview for fear of breaking the
sub-judice rule.
His record so far, however, shows that he, like his
fellow SAAWU officials, has been a constant victim of harassment and
psychological intimidation.
Late in 1981 - about twelve days before he was
detained - he claimed that his telephone was being tampered with almost daily
and that his offices had been broken into.
During one of his
telephone calls, a third person coughed on the phone and when Mr Kikine asked
who was there, a man replied :
"Don 't you know Sam? This is the security
police, Cape Town,"
And on another occasion,
someone telephoned him and said that there was a bomb in the building his union
occupied in Durban's Victoria Street.
Not unexpectedly, the
authorities and the security police denied any knowledge of the telephone
interference and said they were not responsible.
Many observers in South
Africa are not surprised at Mr
Kikine’s harassment because "intimidation and harassment was part of the
life of all people engaged in the fight for a just society in South Africa”.
But they are, however, baffled at the action which
the authorities have brought against him.
One observer said that
normally when a person was charged under the Terrorism Act he was held in
solitary confinement until the end of the trial.
"But in Mr Kikine
's case it seems the authorities have nothing against him and they are just
trying to make his life intolerable," said the observer. Ends – Press
Trust of SA News Agency August 13 1982
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