BOOK REVIEW: Former spook’s memoir about work with Mandela’s spies will ruffle feathers
Author reveals secrets of a dirty war fought by ANC and National Party
Former Umkhonto we Sizwe operative and apartheid police spy Bradley Steyn is likely to find himself in a firestorm when his memoir, Undercover With Mandela’s Spies, is released. Due out in May, the book aims to uncover the “dirty secrets of a dirty war fought by both the ANC and the government of the day”, the National Party headed by FW de Klerk. Important political events during this period were De Klerk’s announcement of the decision to enter into transition negotiations to end apartheid, the release of Nelson Mandela from prison and the unbanning of the ANC and other liberation movements. Steyn, who works in the private security industry, has seen more fire than most. As if walking from one real-life thriller to another, a 17-year-old Steyn is reported to have been a witness to the Strijdom Square massacre. Eight people died on that fateful day in Pretoria, 16 escaping with injuries. November 2018 marked 30 years of the killings. The names of the victims and survivors had not be...
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