ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, January 28, 1997 TAG: 9701280132
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA
SOURCE: Associated Press
Five former police officers plan to seek amnesty for the 1977 killing of activist Steve Biko, whose death galvanized apartheid's opponents and revealed to the world the brutality of the white-led government.
The officers will petition South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the panel led by retired Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu and charged with investigating apartheid-era crimes.
Reports that five men planned to file an amnesty petition were published Monday in The Port Elizabeth Herald. Truth Commission spokeswoman Christelle Terreblanche confirmed that the panel was expecting amnesty applications related to Biko's killing.
Biko, 30, died of untreated head injuries in a Pretoria prison on Sept. 12, 1977. The death - the apparent result of a beating by police, although they denied it - impassioned the anti-apartheid movement inside and outside South Africa, giving the cause its best-known rallying point after then-imprisoned activist Nelson Mandela.
A source close to the five former police officers, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press that the amnesty applications would assert that Biko was ``handled robustly,'' but that there never was any intention to kill him.
The Herald identified the former officers as Col. Harold Snyman, who led the team that interrogated Biko; Lt. Col. Gideon Niewoudt, a detective sergeant at the time; Ruben Marx, a warrant officer; Daantjie Siebert, a captain; and Johan Beneke, a warrant officer.
Detained without charge as a terrorist in Port Elizabeth on the Indian Ocean coast, Biko suffered head injuries there that left him frothing at the mouth and speechless. Despite his wounds, he was denied medical care and driven in the back of a police van nearly 700 miles to Pretoria, where he died three weeks after his arrest.
The charismatic black leader had developed a wide following during the early 1970s, urging South African blacks to take pride in their culture and to fight for control of their country.
At his funeral, pictures of his battered body were widely distributed and later published around the world.
LENGTH: Short : 50 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: (headshot) Bikoby CNB