The Neil Aggett Labour Studies Unit (NALSU) at Rhodes University, Makhanda welcomes the re-investigation of death of Neil Aggett, who died in an apartheid jail. Neil, a leader of the Food and Canning Workers Union, was imprisoned without trial in November 1981. Tortured and beaten at Pretoria Central prison and the notorious John Vorster Square police station, Johannesburg, Neil died in prison on 5 February 1982. He was born in Kenya, moved to South Africa at aged 10 and went to school in Makhanda, at Kingswood College. He studied to become a medical doctor, but believed that the ill-health of his mostly poor, black working class patients was rooted in oppressive and exploitative conditions, and became involved in building the non-racial trade union movement. A week after his death, 100,000 workers from his union and the radical Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU – forerunner of COSATU) held an unprecedented national strike to commemorate the passing of this giant. His funeral at the Anglican cathedral and West Park Cemetery, Johannesburg, attracted 15,000 under the guns of armed police. His torturers were never charged, and the apartheid inquest gave a verdict of "suicide," exonerating the police. The news of a new trial under Judge Motsamai Makume this week is a vindication of the Neil Aggett Support Group, which has long campaigned for a new inquest. NALSU, with the blessing of the Aggett family, continues Neil's legacy with pro-labour, pro-poor research, policy, public events and union education programmes, as the university’s hub of labour studies. NALSU director Professor Lucien van der Walt said that “Neil Aggett fought and died for the principle that a strong workers’ movement was needed to fight for social justice and real freedom. We look forward to justice at long last for Neil, a hero of the working class.”
Issued by Neil Aggett Labour Studies Unit (NALSU) at Rhodes University, Makhanda