Phindile Mfeti

Phindile Mfeti, a first cousin of former State President Thabo Mbeki and nephew of Govin Mbeki was born on 15 December 1946, at Nqamakwe, Eastern Cape. He was the second of three children.

He married Feziwe in 1970 in a traditional ceremony and the couple registered after he was released from detention in 1977.

During the period 1973 to 1975, he worked with Jeanette Curtis compiling an archive of political resistance at the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) in Johannesburg. In 1974, he formed part of the group which set up the Johannesburg-based Industrial Aid Society (IAS). This included Curtis, Miriam Sithole and Steven Friedman.

During 1974 and 1975, he served as a member of the Steering Committee of the IAS, and as a volunteer worker organiser, functioning mainly in the East Rand’s metal industry.

Early in 1975, Mfeti, together with Gavin Anderson and Miriam Sithole, travelled to Botswana to meet with a delegation from the African National Congress (ANC) and the South African Congress of Trade Unions (Sactu). In September 1975 he was elected secretary of the IAS. During this period he became actively involved in ANC underground activities, travelling to Swaziland to meet with Thabo Mbeki and Lindiwe Sisulu in Swaziland.

He was detained under section 6 of the Terrorism Act in 17 May 1976, together with Sisulu, Miriam Sithole and Linda Jiba. Mfeti was released from prison on 17 May 1977. Upon his release, he was placed under house arrest in Germiston.  

In 1978, he was banished to Butterworth, in the Transkei. Colleagues were able to raise a bursary for Mfeti to study law.  The South African authorities eventually agreed to his studying at the University of Natal (now University of kwaZulu-Natal), Durban, after refusing his application to study at the University of Witwatersrand. He remained part of ANC underground activities, and on a number of occasions he was advised to go into exile, which he refused to do.

While in Durban, he would call his wife every Saturday, just before 1pm, from a store run by a friend. He did this, as usual, on 25 April 1987, and then left the store to return to the university residence, where he was staying during his final year of study. He did not arrive there, and was never seen or heard of since.

John Kane Berman, Executive Director of the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR), wrote a letter, on 17 November 1988, a year after Mfeti’s disappearance to a Brigadier A. M. Llas of the South African Police at Ulundi, requesting information regarding Mfeti’s disappearance. 

Commissioner J S M Venter of the South African Police replied on 27 January 1989 informing Berman that every endeavour to trace Mfeti was unsuccessful and that his whereabouts could not be established.

It is widely believed that Mfeti was abducted and assassinated by an Apartheid hit squad because of his ANC activities. At the time, Helen Suzman raised questions about his disappearance in Parliament, without success. His case was also investigated by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), again without any result. His wife testified about the disappearance of her husband at the TRC.