There were emotional scenes at the Joburg High Court on Tuesday after it found that struggle activist, Ernest Moabi Dipale, did not die by suicide in detention.
Members of the infamous Security Branch took Dipale into custody on the morning of 5 August 1982.
Three days later, he was found hanged from his cell at John Vorster Square in Johannesburg.
His death was ruled a suicide at the time.
But a reopened inquest has now found that, as those closest to him always believed, this wasn’t the case.
Ernest Moabi Dipale’s older brother, Tiro Moses Dipale, was so overcome with emotion after the ruling, he couldn’t speak.
Dipale’s brother-in-law, Fulufhelo Matumba, however, said that it had been a long road.
“It’s been a very long road and a very hard road, and some family members couldn’t even gather courage to come and hear the outcome.”
Matumba said that Tuesday’s ruling gave them new hope.
“There’s more hope. If there are different levels of hope, we are now at a different level of hope. We know now what the court has said and it’s not far from what we had always suspected.”
He said that the ruling was not the end but rather that it had opened “a new door”.
-EWN
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