21/12/2025
🤔 The treatment of prisoners on Robben Island during the apartheid era was systematically brutal, designed to strip them of their dignity and humanity. Conditions were harsh, and warders often used physical and psychological abuse.
Here are ten of the most disturbing things done to prisoners on Robben Island:
Arbitrary physical violence and beatings: Warders routinely beat prisoners while they worked or for minor infractions. Testimonies before South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) described patterns of brutal beatings and torture.
Racial discrimination in food and clothing: The quantity and quality of food and clothing depended on a prisoner's race. African prisoners were given smaller rations of poor food (mielie meal and rice) and wore only short pants with no underwear, regardless of the weather, while "Coloured" or Indian prisoners received better provisions and long trousers.
Forced, hazardous hard labor: Prisoners were forced to work in a lime quarry for long hours, often under a scorching sun. The glaring white stone caused permanent eye damage to many, including Nelson Mandela, who developed cataracts from the dust and brightness.
The "tauza" dance: Prisoners were forced to strip naked daily and perform a demeaning "dance" to dislodge any concealed objects, which ended by bending over and exposing their rectums to the warders.
Extreme solitary confinement: Solitary confinement was a common and psychologically damaging punishment for minor "offences" like singing or working too slowly. Prisoners could spend months in complete isolation, losing their ability to speak properly.
Psychological abuse and isolation: When overt physical abuse became less common due to external pressure, warders used psychological tactics. These included preventing academic education, severely censoring letters, denying access to news, and restricting visits to only first-degree relatives.
Inhumane specific tortures: A former prisoner, Mzikhaya Mkhabile, testified to the TRC about being buried alive up to his neck, after which a warder urinated into his mouth.
Lack of basic amenities and medical care: Prisoners slept on thin mats on cold cement floors and had no hot water or beds. Injured or sick inmates often received inadequate medical treatment, leading to infected wounds and long-term health problems.
Punishment by starvation: Warders could withdraw meal "tickets" as punishment, forcing prisoners to go hungry for days. Those who failed to meet daily work quotas in the quarry were also starved.
Capital punishment in early years: In earlier periods of the island's use as a prison, punishments were exceptionally brutal. In one instance from 1735, two prisoners accused of homosexual practices had weights tied to their bodies and were thrown overboard to drown at sea.
