Captured African Leader To Be Released

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29725, 19 January 1962, Page 9

Captured African Leader To Be Released

IN.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright)

CAPE TOWN, Jan. 17.

The South African Justice Department announced tonight that a preparatory examination of allegations of attempted murder and incitement to murder against the Pondo leader, Mr Anderson Ganyile, had been dropped.

A spokesman of the Department said the AttorneyGeneral in Grahamstown had taken this decision because it was now established that Ganyile’s arrest “in fact took place within the border of Basutoland.”

Mr Ganyile had alleged in Court at Umtata. in the Transkei. that he was captured by South African police in a hut in Basutoland last August 26 and dragged over the border into the Union.

Questions have been asked tn the British House of Commons about the alleged kid-

napping. The South African Foreign Minister (Mr Louw) has conveyed to the British Ambassador (Sir John Maud) regrets that the incident occurred. Mr Ganyile told a Court at Umtata a week ago that masked South African Police abducted him from the hut where he was living in exile in Basutoland. He said in an affidavit in the Magistrate’s Court that he hit one of the police with an axe but was overpowered after a “violent struggle.” The police gagged and handcuffed him. his brother and another African and dragged them over the South African border, he said.

Mr Ganvile had been living in the British Protectorate of Basutoland after escaping from a remote part of the Cape Province, to which he had been banished. Permitted To Return

Today’s statement said the decision would be announced in the Magistrate's Court at Umtata on Friday and Mr Ganyile would then be permitted to return to Basutoland.

The statement said the in-

cident took place in a mountainous area on the border of the Republic and Basutoland after police, who were searching for four suspected murderers of an African, Captain Stanford, had crossed the border unwittingly during the night in heavy mist. “In their search, police reached a hut in which they thought the suspected murderers were hiding. They knocked on the door and informed the occupants they were the police. “The door was opened and when they entered a policeman was hit in the face with an axe and seriouslv injured. There were three Bantus in the hut, who. after a struggle with the police, were taken to the police car which had been left at the foot of the mountain in the road. “Onlv after the inciden! was it established that Mr Ganyile was one of the persons.” The Attornev General said he was satisfied the police had acted in good faith. A surveyor had established that they had overshot the border by 638 yards.