S. Africa Blames ‘Terrorists’ for Clashes : Police Say Armed Men at Union Office Were Ready for Attacks

The bloody clashes between police and striking black railway workers that left six people dead and more than 20 injured here this week appear to have been planned by “trained terrorists” operating from the offices of South Africa’s largest labor union federation, the police said Thursday.

The suspected terrorists had gathered several hundred heavily armed men at the headquarters of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, according to a police statement on the incidents, and they reportedly planned to use them in a series of attacks on policemen and their families in revenge for the killing of a railway worker.

A witch doctor was recruited as part of the preparations, the police alleged, to paint spots with a magic black potion on the men’s foreheads, protecting them from police bullets and giving them courage during the attacks. Men with black spots on their foreheads fought in one battle outside a railway station, the police said, and more were arrested at union headquarters.

With its suggestion of African savagery, the police charge that anti-apartheid activists and labor leaders were using witchcraft recalled a case last year in which two white policemen were killed along with eight black miners who thought they would be protected against the security forces by another special potion applied to small cuts on their heads and right sides.

The police said that three “trained terrorists,” a phrase that usually means members of the African National Congress’ military wing, Spear of the Nation, were among the more than 400 people arrested when police, backed by troops, laid siege for seven hours to the 11-story union building in downtown Johannesburg on Wednesday and then cleared it out, taking away the occupants by the truckload.

The statement, issued by police headquarters in Pretoria, sought to answer criticism here and overseas that the security forces had overreacted in dealing with the 22,000 striking railway workers and that their actions may have brought the violent confrontations with the South African Railways and Harbor Workers Union, an affiliate of the 700,000-member Congress of South African Trade Unions.

The first clash occurred when police broke up a meeting of more than 1,000 workers in Germiston, 15 miles east of Johannesburg, a meeting called to discuss the dismissal of nearly 22,000 striking railway employees. Three blacks were killed in that incident.

This was followed by a second battle outside the Doornfontein train station in downtown Johannesburg when riot police stopped about 60 strikers, allegedly armed with machetes, clubs, spears and other weapons, from going to Germiston. Police said they opened fire after tear gas failed to disperse the strikers, who had allegedly attacked them. Three more blacks were killed, several wounded and two policemen critically injured.

Police said they then surrounded the nearby union headquarters because they had seen large groups of armed blacks entering and had information that further assaults were being planned. They said they encountered strong resistance when they entered the building but later evacuated all occupants.

The unions Thursday blamed the clashes on the police, accusing them of concocting stories to cover up unprovoked assaults on the strikers.

Jay Naidoo, general secretary of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, said that the trouble began when police broke up the union meeting in Germiston, using tear gas and whips. As workers burst through the doors and windows of the building in a panic to get away, the police opened fire, according to Naidoo.