Struggle veteran Peter Jones, who was the last person to see Steve Biko alive when they were arrested by apartheid police, has died after suffering a stroke.
Jones had been involved in the Struggle in the 1970s and part of the generation of leaders that fought against apartheid.
Biko and Jones were leaders of the Black People’s Convention and were arrested in a roadblock on their way to Cape Town in 1977.
That was the last time that Jones saw his comrade alive and Biko would later die in prison.
The two men had been on a mission to unite liberation movements at the time.
But the late former minister of justice Dullah Omar, under president Nelson Mandela, in 1996 said an informant had given out information on the two leaders when they were arrested in Cape Town.
After the two leaders were separated that was the last time Jones saw Biko alive. It was only after people who had been protesting at Biko’s funeral were arrested and brought to the same prison where they were that he learnt of Biko’s death.
Jones was later banned and put under house arrest in Somerset West.
After the apartheid government lifted his restrictions he joined Azapo where he was elected vice president together with Kenny Hlako Rachidi.
Rachidi also died late last year.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
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