S. African Black Due to Hang Gets Reprieve : Convicted Killer of Policeman Granted Stay Amid International Appeals for Clemency

An unprecedented 11th-hour reprieve was granted Tuesday night to a supporter of the outlawed African National Congress convicted of murdering a black policeman and sentenced to hang at dawn this morning.

Amid international appeals for clemency, including strong but quiet diplomatic urgings from the United States, a Supreme Court justice in Pretoria gave Benjamin Moloisi, 31, a black upholsterer and poet, a three-week stay of execution in order to present new evidence in his request that President Pieter W. Botha commute his sentence to life imprisonment.

Moloisi’s lawyer, Priscilla Jana, had warned earlier this week that his execution in such a controversial case--he has denied involvement in the 1982 killing and repudiated a confession obtained by police--could set off violent anti-government demonstrations around the country, heightening the present unrest.

The court action came amid scattered but widespread unrest Tuesday and tough police measures to deal with it. One man was killed in the incidents, police said, when a black policeman in Bethal, a farming community 70 miles east of Johannesburg, fired on a crowd of blacks trying to prevent him from going to work.

In Soweto, Johannesburg’s sprawling black suburb, hundreds of police and troops cordoned off one neighborhood for the morning and searched all 600 houses, arresting dozens of black youths, in the first such operation there. Similar house-to-house searches were reported in four other townships east of Johannesburg.

In Westbury, a Johannesburg neighborhood for Coloreds--those of mixed race--police using tear-gas grenades, rubber bullets, clubs and whips clashed repeatedly with student demonstrators protesting housing and other conditions there. At least 10 youths were wounded.

Other incidents involving the stoning of police, firebomb attacks and student protests were reported from 15 cities and towns in Transvaal and Cape provinces and the Orange Free State, and 69 people were arrested in addition to those detained in police sweeps of Soweto and other townships.

But a spokesman at national police headquarters in Pretoria, noting that the state of emergency--imposed in and around Johannesburg, in the Vaal River region south of here and in eastern Cape province--is now a month old, contended that the tough emergency measures have brought “a marked decrease in the number and extent of unrest incidents.” He said that black residents have become “increasingly upset with hooligan elements” in the ghetto townships and are actively supporting the police.

The white liberal opposition Progressive Federal Party, meanwhile, called for a full judicial inquiry into allegations that the police and army have abused their sweeping powers under the state of emergency. President Botha agreed to an investigation earlier this week after church leaders told him of mounting police brutality, but the party wants a member of South Africa’s independent judiciary to conduct the inquiry, not a Justice Ministry official.

Moloisi’s reprieve was the first stay of execution granted in living memory by a South African court after the state president had turned down what is normally a final appeal for mercy.

South African legal and political observers attributed it in large part to calls by Britain, West Germany, the United States and other countries for clemency as well as to widespread protests here.

American diplomats had made strong representations here and in Washington, according to knowledgeable sources, but the State Department chose not to publicize them, apparently out of consideration of Pretoria’s sensitivity about interference in what it considers its internal affairs.

Tuesday morning, the U.N. Security Council, after a closed-door meeting, joined the calls for clemency, issuing a statement repeating a council resolution of January, 1984, asking South Africa not to carry out the execution. To execute Moloisi, the statement said, would “result in the further deterioration of an already extremely grave situation.”

U.N. Action Blocked

Later in the day, the United States and Britain blocked a Security Council statement proposed by African and other nonaligned nations that would have rejected a speech by Botha last week and renewed a call for U.N. members to apply economic sanctions to South Africa.

The proposed statement would have rejected Botha’s proposals for moderating the apartheid system, virtually accused the South African government of burning the home of the wife of imprisoned black nationalist leader Nelson Mandela and asked voluntary economic sanctions by the 159 members of the United Nations.

In the Moloisi case, South African government lawyers did not strongly oppose his petition for a stay of execution, and several sources close to the case said that suggestions had come from the administration, including Botha’s office, that an appeal be lodged although there was no legal precedent for its success.

“The court has rescued Botha from himself,” a prominent defense lawyer remarked, asking not to be quoted by name. “He apparently had wanted to show his toughness by letting Moloisi hang--that is, until he saw the internal and international ramifications. Then he had the problem of backing down without appearing to do so. Now, with this court ruling, Botha should be able to find some new evidence that lets him commute the sentence to imprisonment without any loss of face and thus avoid more domestic and foreign protests.”

The court acted as Moloisi’s mother, Pauline, was beginning an all-night prayer vigil with friends and anti-apartheid activists at Christ the King Catholic Cathedral here--and preparations were under way for a memorial service for him today.

The house-to-house search in Soweto’s Diepkloof neighborhood was the first time the security forces had conducted such an operation there, although they have been used in other black townships since November, and it may be the start of a sweep of all Soweto, which has a population estimated to be as high as 2 million.

Combat troops in more than 80 armored cars and trucks cordoned off the Diepkloof neighborhood before 8 a.m. Tuesday and took up positions 10 yards apart around its perimeter and along most of its streets. Squads of police then searched each house, knocking down doors that were locked, residents said, and going through every room, every cabinet, every drawer.

One young woman, who had been taking a bath when eight policemen, two with snarling dogs, burst into her home, said: “I seemed to have distracted them from their search for the ‘thugs and hooligans’ they said they were looking for. They stood around for the longest time staring at me in my bubble bath.”

Residents’ names were checked against lengthy, computer-printed wanted lists, and dozens of young blacks--some apparently wanted on charges stemming from recent unrest but others for traffic violations--were arrested. Police said they would announce the number arrested today. Those cleared were stamped on the hand or arm with a red arrow that they had to show in order to leave the area and return.

“Do it on their palms--they are lighter there,” an army lieutenant instructed a young soldier who had complained that some men were so dark that the stamps could not be seen. “They ought to give us Day-Glo ink to do this right.”

Times staff writer Don Shannon, at the United Nations, also contributed to this story.