Police Raid Mandela’s Home, Detain 4

Police investigating the murder of a black youth raided activist Winnie Mandela’s home on Sunday, detaining four men and seizing allegedly bloodstained clothing.

The body of Stompie Mokhetsi Seipie, 14, was found last month in Soweto, the sprawling black township outside Johannesburg.

In a possibly related matter, two black men were arrested in the January killing of Dr. Abu Baker Asvat. The Soweto doctor had examined Seipie and was slain the next day. The two suspects will be arraigned today, Maj. Gen. Jaap Joubert, the chief of the investigation, said.

South African police released a videotape of their operation at the Mandela home, showing officers--without gloves--searching trunks of clothing, leafing through photograph albums and collections of African National Congress literature and lifting up what appeared to be blood-soaked sneakers, a knife and a pair of gardening shears.

The camera focused on spots on the walls of some back rooms where the detained men--at least one of whom was associated with the so-called Mandela United soccer team--lived. State-run Radio South Africa said the spots were spatters of blood.

The Mandela United team members have served as unofficial bodyguards for Mandela, the wife of imprisoned ANC leader Nelson R. Mandela.

Winnie Mandela, 54, later angrily denied that the police had found any spots of blood. “It is an absolute lie. There are no blood-spattered walls here,” she told the international television news agency Visnews.

Three Soweto men have said that Mandela’s bodyguards abducted them and Seipie and then beat them at the Mandela house.

Mandela has denied being at home when the four were brought there. But she has defended their abduction and reportedly has said they probably were “slapped” to get them to talk about alleged sexual abuse at the Methodist Church residence where they lived. The church denies her allegations of abuse.

Mandela has also said that Asvat, the slain doctor, could have corroborated her allegations that the four were abused.

Joubert said that one of those detained during the 4 a.m. raid was Jerry Richardson, identified as the soccer team coach. A week ago, Richardson said in an interview with the newspaper City Press that he gave the youths “a few smacks to tell the truth,” and he said Seipie escaped.

Others arrested at the house were not named, but Radio South Africa said they were Mandela’s bodyguards.

Joubert said the four were being questioned but that no charges had been filed.

Disband the Club

The police raid came a day after the Rev. Frank Chikane, general secretary of the South African Council of Churches, announced that Mandela, acting at the request of her husband, had agreed to disband the soccer club and relocate the members.

As a bright moon shone over Mandela’s home in the Diepkloof Extension section of Soweto, police surrounded the compound and began a methodic search.

The police videotape showed that an alarm went off and dogs barked as officers entered the house. It showed Mandela, her daughter, Zinzi, and grandchildren in their bathrobes.

State television broadcast scenes from the film, which police made available to foreign reporters the same day. They do not usually release material so quickly.