On a freezing winter's night, a few hours before dawn on May 12, 1969, South Afr
ican security police stormed the Soweto home of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, activ
ist and wife of the imprisoned Nelson Mandela, and arrested her in the presence
of her two young daughters, then aged nine and ten. Rounded up in a group of oth
er antiapartheid activists under Section 6 of the Terrorism Act, designed for th
e security police to hold and interrogate people for as long as they wanted, she
was taken away. She had no idea where they were taking her or what would happen
to her children.
