From its implementation in 1948 to its dissolution over forty years later, the Apartheid government of South Africa was determined to deny equal rights to its African citizens. Apartheid instituted legal segregation, with its goal being to keep Black South Africans subjugated. As the oppressed mobilized to fight the immoral system, their government responded with state sanctioned violence. Two of the victims of government ordered violence were Griffiths and Victoria Mxenge, activists that were killed because they fought for equality.
Griffiths Mxenge was born in South Africa on February 27th, 1935. The child of farmers from the Eastern Cape region, Griffith was only thirteen years old when Apartheid was implemented in South Africa. While finishing his education at Fort Hare University he joined the youth wing of the ANC in 1959. Griffiths had been inspired to fight against Apartheid from observing the Defiance Campaign, an early 1950’s attempt from the ANC to resist their government. While continuing his education in the field of law he would go on to marry his wife Victoria in 1962.
Similarly to her husband, Victoria had been born in the Eastern Cape in the year 1942. An educated woman, Victoria had pursued a career in nursing, working as a midwife and as a community nurse upon the completion of her studies.
Both Griffiths and Victoria grew up under the shadow of Apartheid. As young adults, they witnessed its brutality firsthand, through events like the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre, the apartheid government’s enforcement of the use of Dompas system, which restricted the movement of africans in south Africa and the Rivonia Trial. These experiences deepened their hatred for the regime and strengthened their resolve to oppose it.
Because of their growing involvement in the struggle, the Mxenge family soon became a target of the apartheid government.
In the 1950s, while a student at Fort Hare university, Griffith joined the ANC Youth League. After completing his BA degree majoring in English and Roman Dutch law, he proceeded with his law degree at the University of Natal. During this time, he married his wife, Victoria Mxenge.
While studying for his law degree, he was detained for 190 days and later convicted under the Suppression of Communism Act because of his ANC activism. He would go on to serve a two-year sentence on Robben Island before eventually being let out in 1969.
Even after his release, the apartheid government continued to target him. Still, he didn’t back down. Griffiths completed his law degree despite all the barriers, and by the mid-1970s, he had opened his own law practice, where he regularly defended ANC members and others who were being persecuted under apartheid law.
His wife, Victoria, initially trained as a nurse. However, she was so deeply inspired by her husband’s dedication that she went on to earn a law degree herself and joined Griffiths at his firm as a human rights lawyer.
One of Griffiths’s greatest accomplishments was helping to pressure South African authorities into prosecuting the killers of Joseph Mduli. Mduli, a client of Griffiths, had been a member of uMkhonto weSizwe, the armed wing of the ANC. On March 18th, 1976, he was abducted and tortured to death by South African authorities. After an attempt to have his cause of death covered up, the authorities were forced by widespread pressure to allow a public autopsy. The examination revealed that he had been tortured to death, refuting the claims by authorities that he had died from falling off a chair and hitting his head.
Although the officers accused of killing Mduli were never convicted, the case drew national and international media attention to the brutal tactics being used by the apartheid regime. Griffiths, who was detained during the trial, played a key role in exposing the truth and challenging the system. His efforts helped shine a spotlight on the human rights abuses occurring in South Africa at the time.
Griffith Mxenge’s unwavering commitment to the anti-apartheid cause came at a high cost. His legal activism had already led to imprisonment, constant harassment, and countless death threats.
In November 1981, those threats became reality. He was abducted by members of Vlakplaas, a covert apartheid death squad. In his early forties and at the height of his life and career, Griffith was brutally murdered, stabbed, slashed, and battered with a hammer. Once they were sure he was dead, the killers dumped his body in a soccer field.
In order to cover their tracks, the Apartheid authorities claimed that Mxenge was killed by members of the ANC, a claim that the organization denied, and that Griffith’s family did not believe.
To cover up the crime, apartheid authorities falsely claimed that Mxenge had been killed by members of the ANC. The organization firmly denied any involvement, and Griffith’s family rejected the accusation, knowing it was an attempt to shift blame away from the regime.
Following her husband’s assassination, Victoria kept the practice running and played a more prominent role as a human rights lawyer and a political activist.
During her time as a lawyer she took part in the Pietermaritzburg Treason Trial, assisted in the campaign to release Nelson Mandela, and advocated for the better treatment of underage prisoners.
In 1985 she was also one of the speakers at the funeral of the “Craddock Four.” The Craddock Four were a group of South African activists that had been abducted and brutally murdered by members of Vlakplaas. As their deaths had been so similar to that of her husband, her words were of great importance to the tens of thousands that were present for the funeral.
Unfortunately, Victoria’s activism made her a target of the Apartheid government. Less than a month after her funeral speech, an ambush was laid for her. On August 1st, 1985 Victoria was shot to death in her driveway.
Griffiths and Victoria Mxenge were survived by their children Mbasa, Viwe, and Namhla. The three had unfortunately witnessed their mother’s death.
In the immediate aftermath of the killings there was little no chance of the culprits facing justice for their crimes. Vlakplaas had successfully covered up their crimes, and the government judiciary, and press were not going to push for justice for the victims. However, in the late 1980’s circumstances began to change, and a revelation of what had occurred would soon be made public knowledge.
In 1988, a South African policeman named Butana Nofomela was sentenced to death for murdering a farmer. Nofomela had once been a member of Vlakplaas, the secret police unit responsible for killing anti-apartheid activists. He had also taken part in the murder of Griffiths Mxenge.
On the day he was supposed to be hanged, Nofomela began revealing details about Vlakplaas and its operations in a desperate attempt to save his life.
Around the same time, Dirk Coetzee, a former commander of Vlakplaas, had started falling out with the organization. By the mid-1980s, Coetzee had been removed from his position for insubordination and found himself in conflict with his former colleagues.
After hearing about Nofomela’s confession, Coetzee fled South Africa and began working with the ANC in exile. He gave public interviews confirming the existence of death squads and revealing that they operated with the approval of the South African government.
In a strange twist, Coetzee, the same man who had helped plan Griffiths Mxenge’s murder, was now being protected by members of uMkhonto weSizwe, the ANC’s armed wing.
The revelations of government sponsored death squads led to further national outrage against the government of South Africa. As Apartheid collapsed in the early 1990’s, the crimes that the government had committed against its own citizens could no longer be hidden. With the release of Nelson Mandela, and his ascension to the presidency, what should have been a moment of exultation for the Mxenge family was instead a bittersweet victory.
In 1997 South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation granted amnesty to Coetzee and the other agents that had participated in Griffith’s murder. The government authorities that had sanctioned their killings were free to escape into anonymity as well.
As they paid the ultimate price for challenging Apartheid, Griffiths and Victoria Mxenge were honored with the Order of Luthuli. The two of them are buried together in Rhayi Cemetery. Over fourty years after their killings, they continue to serve as inspirations to South Africans.
Sources:
https://www.saha.org.za/news/2011/November/griffiths_mxenge_a_fallen_hero.htm
https://sahistory.org.za/people/victoria-nonyamezelo-mxenge
https://web.archive.org/web/20110604092329/http://www.info.gov.za/speeches/1997/08050w13297.htm
https://www.thepresidency.gov.za/mlungisi-griffiths-mxenge-and-victoria-nonyamezelo”>
