South Africa marked 49 years since anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko died in police detention on 12 September 1977, as a reopened inquest in Gqeberha this week heard forensic evidence that his fatal head injuries were inflicted over multiple days, not in a single scuffle as the apartheid police originally claimed.
Biko, founder of the Black Consciousness Movement and the South African Students’ Organisation (SASO), was arrested on 18 August 1977 at a roadblock outside Makhanda. He was detained in Gqeberha, beaten, transported naked and unconscious to Pretoria Central Prison on 11 September, and died the following day in a prison hospital at the age of 30.
“It’s very clear in our minds as to what happened and how they killed Steve Biko,” Biko’s son Nkosinathi Biko told the BBC during this week’s commemoration.
According to Daily Maverick reporting, forensic pathologist Dr Shakeera Holland testified at the inquest that injuries documented during the original autopsy point to repeated, brutal assaults separated by hours and days. She told the court, “There is no evidence to indicate that the extensive injuries documented during Biko’s original autopsy were inflicted during a single incident.”
The new testimony directly contradicts the version of a single scuffle put forward by the security police at the time. Anti-apartheid activist Monde Mditshwa also told the inquest on 31 August 2026 that detainees were routinely beaten with a green hosepipe known as the “Green Mamba,” a detail reported exclusively by Daily Maverick and not yet confirmed by other outlets.
No individual was held criminally responsible after the original 1977 inquest, though brain injury was recorded as the cause of death. Five former apartheid police officers later applied for amnesty at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1997, admitting collusion and false affidavits, but their applications were refused.
Nkosinathi Biko said the reopened inquest, part of a broader push to address cold cases from the apartheid era, must lead to prosecutions. “What is required from this process is simply to follow the facts, and we have no doubt that a democratic court, in a democratic state, will find that Steve Biko’s murder was an act, orchestrated and executed by those who were with him – the five policemen who are implicated in this case,” he told the BBC.
CapeFlats.co.za journalists were present at the Gqeberha High Court for this week’s hearings, alongside reporters from Daily Maverick and the BBC. The specific details of Dr Holland’s testimony—including remarks about tramline scars consistent with a rod-shaped object and signs of kidney failure—remain unverified by a second independent source, and we are checking with the National Prosecuting Authority for confirmation.
The inquest continues, with further testimony expected before the court adjourns. CapeFlats.co.za will provide an update once the next hearing date is confirmed.