"We Still Want the Truth": The ANC's Angolan Detention Camps and Post-Apartheid Memory

In fighting for justice in our land, we must ensure at all times that justice exists inside our own organization—our members, the people of South Africa, and the people of the world must know and feel that for us justice is not merely an ideal but the fundamental principle that governs all our actions. Accordingly, we must at all times act justly in our own ranks, train our people in the procedure of justice and establish the embryo of the new justice system we envisage for a liberated South Africa.

—Official African National Congress (ANC) Code of Conduct

We were at war. You remember I said we were at war . . . . There might be times that I will use the third degree, in spite of the fact that this is not policy.

—General Andrew Masondo, the ANC National Commissar, 1977–85, responding before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to inquiries about atrocities, including executions, in the Quatro prison camp in Angola

I want the ANC to come with the truth . . . . I want them to dig for the truth . . . . I want my organisation to apologise for the appalling treatment that they gave me.

—Patrick Hlongwane, former prisoner at Quatro testifying before the TRC, in response to a question asking what he would like the TRC to do for him in light of the abuse he had suffered

When Sergeant Olefile Samuel Mngpibisa of the South African National Defense Force (SANDF) testified at the Human Rights Violations hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in Johannesburg on 25 July 1996, it was not to recount the maltreatment that he endured at the hands of the apartheid regime but rather to relate his harrowing experiences while in an African National Congress (ANC) prison camp in Angola. As part of his testimony, Mngpibisa declared that

I love the ANC because the ANC is the people . . . . Individuals within the ANC abused their powers and they must be exposed. They hide behind the ANC and continue with their criminal activities. I once more lastly appeal to President Mandela to please take action against those who abused us in exile. This will help in healing our land. Perpetrators must be brought in front of the TRC in our presence, so that we (can) question them.¹

For Mngpibisa, it was important to confront the prison guards who had abused him, as he perceived their public engagement with his account to be essential to the healing process for both himself and the postapartheid South African nation. As other victims of internecine ANC violence testified before the TRC about their horrific experiences in ANC detention centers—most notably the notorious Quatro detention center in Angola—their accounts also challenged the official exile narrative, forcing the nation to consider these disclosures and what they meant. No doubt, testimony of this nature paled in comparison to the copious accounts of atrocities committed by the apartheid regime. But in many ways this testimony is potentially more injurious to the ongoing healing process of the nation, as it implicated the ANC—an entity widely seen as the author of this process—in behavior reminiscent of the very regime it had succeeded in toppling.

After the ANC had transitioned from a guerrilla movement in exile to the ruling party in the new South Africa state, it grew increasingly resistant to accepting accountability for alleged human rights violations in its past. Responding during the TRC to such allegations, ANC leaders acknowledged that the violent occurrences in Quatro and elsewhere were "excessive," but were neither condoned by the leadership nor part of its standard operating policy. Party officials also attempted to rationalize these transgressions by characterizing them as unfortunate corollaries of the violent political struggle while actively attempting to bury them under the weight...