Man behind S. African anti-apartheid hero’s murder wins release

A South African court ruled Friday that the white man who provided the gun used to kill the black Communist Party leader Chris Hani in 1993 should be released on medical grounds.

Clive Derby-Lewis, 79, has been serving a life sentence since his conviction for conspiracy to commit the murder, which took the country to the brink of a race war.

Protests erupted in black townships following the murder of Hani, who was seen as one of the great leaders of the anti-apartheid movement and often spoke out against violence.

Derby-Lewis, who is suffering from lung cancer, will be freed on medical parole after he went to court after several unsuccessful applications to the parole board.

Judge Selby Baqwa in the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria ordered that Hani’s parole conditions should be set by June 5.

The youth wing of the South African Communist Party said it was “utterly dismayed” by the court’s decision, believing Derby-Lewis was unrepentant for his actions.

“We are of the view that he still shielding and protecting those who he collaborated with,” it said, calling Derby-Lewis a “cold hearted murderer”.

Hani was the general secretary of the South African Communist Party and chief of staff of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the ruling African National Congress (ANC).

He was shot dead in the driveway of his house on April 10 1993, in a suburb east of Johannesburg, one year before South Africa’s first free elections.

His assassin, Janusz Walus, a Polish immigrant, is still serving a life sentence in Pretoria prison.

Prison authorities last year revealed that the pair were stabbed by a fellow inmate and suffered minor injuries.

Hani’s widow has repeatedly opposed Derby-Lewis’s release, arguing he had shown no remorse since he was jailed in 1993.

One of South Africa’s most notorious murderers, Eugene de Kock, was granted parole in January after 20 years in jail.

De Kock, dubbed “Prime Evil”, was sentenced in 1996 to two life terms plus 212 years in prison for his activities as head of a police death squad targeting anti-apartheid activists.