| Country: | South Africa |
| Details of Formation: | Buthelezi, the Chief Minister of the Zulu community, revived the Inkatha as a political party in 1975. Armed operations are reported from 1985 onward. |
| Details of Termination: | No operations by Inkatha were reported after November 1993. In 1994, the IFP, which was affiliated with the Inkatha PGM, was in a coalition government with its former enemy ANC. Inkatha and other “private armies” were disarmed in 1994. The termination date represents the date the new government led by Mandela assumed power. |
| Purpose: | The main purpose was to suppress government critics, especially ANC and UDF supporters and activists. Inkatha was trained and operated as a counterinsurgent force with the aim of destabilizing the anti-apartheid movement. The group also provided protection for Inkatha party leaders. |
| Organisation: | Cabinet Ministers approved security police funding of Inkatha activities, and the Directorate of Military Intelligence provided funding too. The ANC said in 1991 that there had been up to $ 614,000 in government funding for the Inkatha over the last 6 years. The South African military, the SADF, supported Inkatha by providing training, financial and logistical management, but also supervised the hit squad. The group additionally received funding from the US-based conservative Heritage Foundation. A news source from 1982 mentions a formal alliance between Inkatha and the Labour Party. The KwaZulu police furthered the interests of Inkatha, and some group members who had received training on Caprivi became part of the police but remained active in the Inkatha group. Inkatha is headed by Gatsha Buthelezi, the Chief Minister of the Zulu, the largest black ethnic group. In townships, the group mainly operated from hostels, which it transformed into military barracks. |
| Weapons and Training: | The Directorate of Military Intelligence provided military training, at least from 1986 to 1989. It took place in Caprivi Strip of then South African-occupied Namibia. At least three paramilitary training camps were constructed, with the biggest being the Mlaba Camp. Police forces provided weapons to Inkatha members. Inkatha used a wide range of weapons, including spears, shields, knobkerries, handguns, R1 rifles, shotguns, grenades, incendiary devices, “traditional” weapons, pangas, assegais and sticks. |
| Size: | In 1985, news sources state a membership between 900,000 and 1,115,094 members. In 1987, another news source says Inkatha had 1.6 million members. |
| Reason for Membership: | The group had many members among Zulu hostel dwellers. Some of them reported that they felt compelled to join because of the violence between Inkatha and the ANC, as Zulus were attacked irrespective of their political allegiances. The group used the ethnic divides to mobilize by propagating ethnic and cultural Zulu values. Inkatha leaders cooperated with Native authority structures, including chiefs, headmen and warlord leaders who helped recruit members by denying non-members land and service allocation. A KwaZulu police officer said that he had been instructed at KwaZulu Police College to join Inkatha. |
| Treatment of Civilians: | The conflict between Inkatha and ANC/UDF, which mainly took place in Kaw-Zulu Natal and the cities of Johannesburg and Vereeniging, is estimated to have cost 20 000 lives. The Inkatha members mainly targeted and killed ANC supporters, union leaders and anti-apartheid activists, including students. Children and women were among the victims. The Inkatha vigilantes conducted mass attacks on hostels, massacres on trains and looted and burned thousands of houses, sometimes with families still inside. Many civilians were forced to flee the violence. Sometimes the group acted on its own, sometimes on police or military orders. The police were biased towards Inkatha members and passively or actively colluded in Inkatha attacks. |
| Other Information: | The PGM is also known by its full name Inkatha Yenkululeko Yesizwe (National Cultural Liberation Movement). During the 1980s, it is difficult to distinguish the political from the armed faction of the Inkatha. As members were Zulu South Africans, some sources refer to the armed Inkatha members as Zulu warriors. The group of Inkatha members that received training on Caprivi is called hit squad. |
| References: |
Amnesty International. 1992. “South Africa: State of fear: security force complicity in torture and political killings, 1990-1992.” AI INDEX: AFR 53/09/92. 9 June. Hickel, Jason. 2015. Democracy as Death: The Moral Order of Anti-Liberal Politics in South Africa. Oakland: University of California Press. Segal, Lauren. 1992. “The Human Face of Violence: Hostel Dwellers Speak.” Journal of Southern African Studies 18 (1): 190–231. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2637187. |