The Rivonia Trial is a trial that took place in apartheid-era South Africa between 9 October 1963 and 12 June 1964, after a group of anti-apartheid activists were arrested on Liliesleaf Farm in Rivonia. The farm had been the secret location for meetings of uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the newly-formed armed wing of the African National Congress. The trial took place at the Palace of Justice, Pretoria, and led to the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Govan Mbeki, Ahmed Kathrada, Denis Goldberg, Raymond Mhlaba, Elias Motsoaledi, Andrew Mlangeni. Many were convicted of sabotage and sentenced to life.
Origins
The Rivonia Trial took its name from Rivonia, a suburb of Johannesburg. Various people and groups, including the African National Congress and Communist Party of South Africa, had been using Liliesleaf Farm, owned by Arthur Goldreich, as a hideout. Nelson Mandela moved onto the farm in October 1961 and evaded security police while masquerading as a gardener and cook called David Motsamayi. He was arrested on 5 August 1962 without the farm having been discovered.
On 11 July 1963, the farm was raided by the South African Police. Lionel Bernstein, Denis Goldberg, Arthur Goldreich, Bob Hepple, Abdulhay Jassat, Ahmed Kathrada, Govan Mbeki, Raymond Mhlaba, Andrew Mlangeni, Moosa Moolla, Elias Motsoaledi, Walter Sisulu and Harold Wolpe were all arrested by. They were detained under the General Law Amendment Act No 37 of 1963, which allowed for detention of up to ninety days. Other key leaders such as Oliver Tambo, Moses Kotane, Joe Slovo, Moses Mabhida, Stephen Dlamini, Joe Modise, Alfred Nzo, Wilton Mkwayi and others were not at the farm at the time of the arrests.
The arrest of the MK high command members resulted in them being sentenced to life imprisonment, to others being arrested and to others going into exile.
Those arrested and those who stood trial
Arrested were: Lionel Bernstein, architect and member of the South African Communist Party (SACP) Denis Goldberg, a Cape Town engineer and leader of the Congress of Democrats Arthur Goldreich Bob Hepple Abdulhay Jassat James Kantor, brother-in-law of Harold Wolpe Ahmed Kathrada Nelson Mandela Govan Mbeki Raymond Mhlaba Andrew Mlangeni Moosa Moolla Elias Motsoaledi, trade union and ANC member Walter Sisulu Harold Wolpe, prominent attorney and activist
Goldberg, Bernstein, Wolpe, Kantor, and Goldreich were Jewish South Africans; Hepple was of English descent on his father's side and Dutch and Jewish on his mother's; Jassat, Kathrada, Moolla were Indian Muslims; Mandela, Mbeki and Mhlaba were Xhosa people; Motsoaledi and Mlangeni were Sothos and Sisulu was Xhosa (he had an English father and a Xhosa mother).
The leaders who were prosecuted in the Rivonia Trial also included Mandela, who was in Pretoria Local prison, where he was serving a five-year sentence for inciting workers to striketrade unions were illegal for black workersand leaving the country illegally.
The government took advantage of legal provisions allowing for accused persons to be held for 90 days without trial, and the defendants were held incommunicado. Withstanding beatings and torture, Goldreich, Jassat, Moolla and Wolpe escaped from jail on 11 August. Their escape infuriated the prosecutors and police, who considered Goldreich to be "the arch-conspirator".
The chief prosecutor was Percy Yutar, deputy attorney-general of the Transvaal. The presiding judge was Quartus de Wet, judge-president of the Transvaal. The first trial indictment document listed 11 names as the accused. The trial began on the 6 October 1963 til 12 June 1964. Counsel for the accused successfully challenged the legal sufficiency of the document, with the result that Justice de Wet quashed it. Prior to dismissal of the first indictment, the state withdrew all charges against Bob Hepple, Hepple subsequently fled the country, without testifying, and stated "that he never had any intention of testifying". The second indictment thus only listed 10 out of the original 11 names, referring to them as Accused 1 through 10: Nelson Mandela (Accused No. 1) Walter Sisulu (Accused No. 2) Denis Goldberg (Accused No. 3) Govan Mbeki (Accused No. 4) Ahmed Kathrada (Accused No. 5) Lionel Bernstein (Accused No. 6) Raymond Mhlaba (Accused No. 7) James Kantor (Accused No. 8) Elias Motsoaledi (Accused No. 9) Andrew Mlangeni (Accused No. 10); he was the last to testify on trial Bob Hepple (Accused No. 11); he never testified.
Mlangeni, who died on 21 July 2020, was the last surviving Rivonia defendant following the death of Goldberg on 29 April same year.