Resistance Against Apartheid Started Young

(On June 16, 1976, the youth of Soweto, Johannesburg’s massive Black township, rose up to protest a new rule making Afrikaans the language of instruction in their schools, a language that most did not know well. They were led by Tsietsi Mashinini, a charismatic high schooler. The nationwide eruption that Tsietsi set in motion on that day would change South Africa, and his family, forever. Indeed, many of Tsietsi’s 12 siblings, and even his parents, Nomkhitha and Joseph, got swept up in the ensuing political violence in which hundreds of protesters died and thousands more were injured. Today marks the 50th anniversary of the uprising.)

In Soweto, the police started the raids on the Mashininis’ home that night, ostensibly looking for Tsietsi. The first raid was terrifying. The police came at about two o’clock in the morning, blocking off the surrounding streets with their “hippos,” armoured personnel carriers. Nomkhitha and Joseph awoke to a deafening pounding on the door; torches shone in every window, illuminating

the policemen with their guns drawn. They screamed in Afrikaans to open the door. Joseph let them in and about a dozen security men, Black and white, rampaged through the house, shining their lights in the eyes of the sleep-dazed children, pawing through wardrobes, peering under beds and behind the stove, tearing apart furnishings in their search. A white officer demanded to see Tsietsi.

“He isn’t here, he never came home,” Nomkhitha stammered, drawing a blanket around her nightgown.

“Where is he staying?”

“We don’t know.”

Disgruntled, the policemen stormed out of the house. Joseph, Nomkhitha and the children stood silently around the dining-room table, trying to calm their pounding hearts; the littlest ones shivered from the cold and fear. Nomkhitha put the younger children back into bed. Then she, Joseph and the others began tidying up the chaos the police had left in their wake. They had just finished and were drifting off to sleep when they heard a thunderous noise: torches shone in every window, guns appeared silhouetted against the light, men yelled in Afrikaans that they were going to kick in the door. Joseph raced from his bed to unlock the bolt. And another raid began.

From that time forward, night after night, the police conducted raids on the Mashinini home. Often, they came several times within the span of a few hours. They inflicted a kind of psychological terror upon the family, especially on the youngest members. As the last rays of sunlight disappeared and darkness descended on the township, some of the younger children would start asking Nomkhitha, “Will the police come tonight? Will the police come tonight?” They took to waking at every noise, running to their parents’ bed. At the first hint of the approaching “hippos,” the youngsters roused everyone; the family was usually waiting for the police when they came.

I wish she would be quiet, I wish she would be quiet.

Eventually, Nomkhitha’s exhaustion and fury at having her home violated overpowered her fear. “Get out of my bedroom!” she shrieked at the policemen busy dumping the contents of her dresser on the floor. “How dare you touch my things!” Once, she began scolding the security men about their weapons. “I will not answer your questions if you have all these big guns in my house. Get out with these guns, they are frightening my children, they can’t sleep at night.”

Surprisingly, the policemen complied by putting the larger weapons outside in their cars; the commanding officer explained to Joseph they had to keep their sidearms for their own protection.

On another occasion, Nomkhitha refused to respond to their interrogation until they sat down on chairs. “It’s not my culture!” she shouted at one group. “Take seats if you want to talk to me. Take seats!” Nomkhitha yelled at the policemen in Xhosa and English; they swore back at her in Afrikaans, muttering about this kaffir bitch who gives birth to terrorists. The adversaries made for a striking scene, exchanging insults in mutually unintelligible languages in the dead of night.

Nomkhitha’s stridency drove Joseph mad. In contrast to his wife, Joseph was calm, polite, careful not to do anything to upset the intruders. After the police left, Joseph would beseech Nomkhitha not to provoke them; he feared the security officers might do something horrible because of her belligerence. Nomkhitha retorted that he was too passive. But her outbursts frightened the children too. Ten-year-old Tshepiso would clamp his hands over his ears to shut out the exchanges between his mother and the policemen, repeating to himself: I wish she would be quiet, I wish she would be quiet.

Even after the security officers withdrew, the Mashinini house remained under constant surveillance. A Volkswagen Beetle was always parked, rather conspicuously, across the street; a second one was stationed up the road. Nonetheless, Tsietsi managed to sneak home every few days. He would furtively approach the back of his family’s lot and peer through the leaves that covered the fence. If no policemen were visible, he would give a high-pitched whistle that his siblings recognized. The noise brought them racing to the yard. Tsietsi sent one of them to the front as a lookout, while the others eagerly plied him with questions about his activities.

He recounted stories of his escapades and taught the youngsters revolutionary slogans. “Amandla!” they chanted, their clenched fists punching the air, “Black power!” If he were feeling particularly bold, Tsietsi entered the house to have a bath, change his clothes, eat a meal, all the while singing anti-apartheid songs. Sometimes he stayed for as long as an hour. Then Tsietsi would creep back to the fence, check the area for “hippos,” and disappear into the labyrinth of Soweto’s backyards.

As if the police brutality were not sufficient punishment, certain friends and relatives ostracized the Mashininis.

Nomkhitha eagerly awaited Tsietsi’s visits; they allowed her to know that he was alive. But she also feared for his safety every minute he spent at home. With all the raids and surveillance, the police were bound to find Tsietsi in the house one day. Nomkhitha could not understand why they kept missing him. She began to suspect they were trailing Tsietsi, hoping he would lead them to fellow student leaders. Or perhaps the Black policemen, who often watched the house without their white commanding officer, secretly sympathized with the uprising.

As if the police brutality were not sufficient punishment, certain friends and relatives ostracized the Mashininis. Some avoided Nomkhitha, they said, because she was Tsietsi’s mother; he was the reason children had died or were in jail. Others stopped talking to all members of the family. A few particularly spiteful types propagated rumours: if you visit the Mashinini house, you will be arrested; if you are seen with a Mashinini, you will be arrested; and so on. (One bit of gossip had it that Nomkhitha was a sangoma, a witch doctor.) The revilement took a terrible toll on her and Joseph.

Not everyone treated the couple as pariahs, though. They found much support in their church: there the minister offered prayers for the children who were in detention or had fled and often mentioned the Mashinini family specifically. Members pointedly visited Joseph and Nomkhitha at home to partake of special services for the students. And many congregants spoke of their admiration for Tsietsi. They came forward to tell stories of previous encounters with him. While some were obvious fabrications, meant to aggrandize the narrator by his association with Tsietsi, most seemed true. The anecdotes conveyed a pride in knowing Tsietsi and solidarity with his family.

Nonetheless, Nomkhitha feared Tsietsi’s luck would not hold. And, if the police did capture him, she believed he would die in detention. The authorities would say he had hanged himself, or jumped from a window, or done any of the other implausible things they gave as explanations for the scores of activists who died while in police custody. Tsietsi scoffed at Nomkhitha when she spoke of her concern. “I wish I could see my funeral,” he laughed, with all the arrogance of youth. To a Black journalist, Tsietsi said: “I don’t say they can’t get me. I know they can kill me any time. What they don’t know is that they cannot kill the spirit. They will kill me now, but there will be another Tsietsi, a day or even an hour later.”

One evening, Tsietsi appeared at the house to say goodbye to his family. His arrival astonished Nomkhitha; she had just read a story in the newspapers, planted by a veteran anti-apartheid activist, that Tsietsi had fled South Africa. Tsietsi was delighted by the ruse. Now the road is clear to go, he explained, but would not tell his parents when he was departing or his destination for fear of further implicating them. Nomkhitha kissed and hugged Tsietsi; she clung to him for an extra second, not wanting to let him go.

Yet she knew he would be safer outside the country. Nomkhitha took comfort in the belief that he would soon be back; if the uprising continued apace, South Africa would be liberated in just a year or two. Joseph said he wanted to pray. The family formed a circle, joined hands and bowed their heads as Joseph intoned a prayer for his son’s safety. Then Tsietsi left, with a smile and wave of his hand as he vanished into the night.

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From A Burning Hunger. Used with the permission of the publisher, Ohio University Press. Copyright © 2026 by Lynda Schuster