New probe reveals shocking details about Albert Luthuli's original death inquest

A MAGISTRATE had premeditated the outcome of the original inquest into the death of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Albert Luthuli, says the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

- BONGANI HANS

For decades that original inquest had maintained that Luthuli died after being hit by a goods train on July 21, 1967, in Stanger, on the north coast of KwaZulu-Natal.

Judge Qondeni Radebe, State Advocate Ncedile Dunywa painted a picture of how the justice system might have collaborated with apartheid police in subverting the truth behind the death, which many people suspected to be a murder.

Dunywa said the outcome of the inquest, held the same year Luthuli died, was not based on fact and evidence, “but rather on the suppression of justice aimed at ensuring that the perpetrators remained hidden and protected”.

He said Magistrate CI Boswell, who was appointed to preside over the inquest on Luthuli's death, wrote correspondence on August 4, 1967, preempting the outcome even before the evidence was presented before him.