Apartheid-era police officers found guilty of murder
South Africa has convicted two former apartheid-era police officers for the 1987 murder of student activist Caiphus Nyoka. The verdict from a Johannesburg court on Tuesday comes after the case had remained unresolved for almost four decades.
The convictions follow a public confession in 2019 by another former officer, Johan Marais, who admitted his role in Nyoka’s killing. Marais was sentenced earlier this year to 15 years in prison.
Marais noted that the deceased had been an outspoken opponent of the apartheid government and that he often confronted the regime and “its discriminatory policies in public,” as quoted by The Star. According to Marais, Nyoka’s active role in local politics led the authorities to regard him as “a threat to the apartheid government.”
The Gauteng High Court sentenced former Sergeant Abraham Hercules Engelbrecht, 61, for the premeditated murder of Nyoka. Former Sergeant Pieter Stander, 60, was also found guilty of the same charge.
Around 2:30am on August 24, 1987, Stander, Engelbrecht, and other Reaction Unit members arrived at Nyoka’s homestead and stormed his room, where he was sleeping with three friends. After identifying him, they removed the friends and shot Nyoka nine times, NPA regional spokesperson Lumka Mahanjana said.
“He died on the scene as a result of multiple gunshot wounds,” Mahanjana stated.
According to The Citizen, the court postponed the case to December 11 for a bail application, pending the sentencing of Engelbrecht and Stander, who remain in custody.
The case resurfaced in 1997 when the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) examined Nyoka’s killing along with thousands of other suspected politically motivated deaths. However, no one acknowledged involvement.
The verdict comes amid a broader wave of reopened investigations into apartheid-era deaths. In October of this year, a court ruled that anti-apartheid icon Albert Luthuli had been beaten to death by security police – overturning the original 1967 finding that he died in a train accident.
Authorities have also announced plans to investigate other historical cases, including the 1977 death of prominent activist Steve Biko while in police custody.
