Church Street Pretoria Bombing

4 1 0

by tpksstories

by tpksstories

The Church Street bombing was acar bomb attack on 20 May 1983 in the South African capital Pretoriaby uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the paramilitary wing of the AfricanNational Congress. The bombing killed 19 people, including the twoperpetrators, and wounded 217. The Church Street Bombing was the mostdeadly attack by the ANC against South Africa's ruling NationalParty.

Attack

The terrorist attack consisted of a carbomb set off outside the Nedbank Square Building, which was rented bythe South African Air Force, on Church Street West, Pretoria, at 4:30pm on 20 May 1983. The target was supposedly South African Air Force(SAAF) headquarters, but as the bomb was set to go off at the heightof rush hour, those killed and wounded included civilians. The bombexploded ten minutes earlier than planned, killing two of theperpetrators, Freddie Shangwe and Ezekial Maseko, along with 17 otherpeople. At least 20 ambulances took the dead and wounded tohospitals.

Truth Commission hearing

In submissions to the Truth andReconciliation Commission (TRC) in 1997 and 1998, the ANC revealedthat the attack was orchestrated by a special operations unit of theANC's Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), commanded by Aboobaker Ismail. At thetime of the attack, they reported to Joe Slovo as chief of staff, andthe Church Street attack was authorized by Oliver Tambo.

The ANC's submission said the bombingwas in response to a South African cross-border raid into Lesotho inDecember 1982, which killed 42 ANC supporters and civilians, and theassassination of Ruth First, an ANC activist and the wife of JoeSlovo, in Maputo, Mozambique. It claimed that 11 of the casualtieswere SAAF personnel and hence a military target. The legalrepresentative of some of the victims argued that as administrativestaff including telephonists and typists they could not accept thatthey were a legitimate military target.

Ten MK operatives, including AboobakerIsmail, applied for amnesty for this and other bombings. Theapplications were opposed on various grounds, including that it was aterrorist attack disproportionate to the political motive. The TRCfound that the number of civilians versus military personnel killedwas unclear. Police statistics indicated that seven members of theSAAF were killed. The commission found that at least 84 of theinjured were SAAF members or employees. Amnesty was granted by theTRC in 2000.