After an unpleasant engagement on here recently where I mentioned the impact that Robben Island had on inmates & families, my sister coincidentally pulled a transcript from my uncles, Vusi Nkumane, papers about his experience 12 years on Robben Island
Here's an excerpt:
[THREAD]

1. My uncle died of lung cancer shortly after my mum died of cancer too. I’d always wondered why he was a member of the PAC rather than the ANC given our family’s position (aunt married into the Luthuli’s & gran and others were ANC etc)
Here he offers a striking reflection:

2. What was really striking to me from the above was his (& that generations) Pan Africanist politics. There was a deep awareness of the local as continental & oppression as global.
We often neglect to include how decolonial movements radicalized swathes of young people in 1960s

3. Here, the interviewer asks my uncle about his time in prison & its effects on him & others
My uncle Vusi was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment on Robben Island at 18 years old in 1963.
Here he explains how prison dehumanizes you, violence he suffered even eating his own blood

4. I want us to take a beat here:

He was assaulted by NINE wardens to the point where the ate his own blood.
All because of a smuggled newspaper. A NEWSPAPER!

An important point he makes is why they were kept so long: de radicalization through dehumanization.

5. Ending this excerpt, my uncle beautifully explains why & how he made what is now called “The Nkumane Saxophone”.

Robben Island’s sole purpose was to kill people slowly using a system of breaking inmates’ personhood.

But they resisted. He reclaimed joy necessary for life:

6.Vusi Nkumane, uncle to me and PAC stalwart & struggle hero to many others, is my hero.

The Apartheid regimes real talent was killing people, slowly. Like many, my uncle died from lung cancer linked to the limestone quarries. My grandparents died in 1 year after his detention.

That was the real power of Robben Island: execution not only risked unrest but it was too easy an end for activists they preferred to kill using torturous imprisonment. Many left as shells of themselves.

Apartheid was so sophisticated because it killed, patiently.

End

Addendum:
Vusi Nkumane was prisoner 282/63 on Robben Island after being found guilty of sabotage.

He served as PAC Treasurer-General and NEC member.

Headed Pace Community College in Soweto 90s-00s

Led campaigns for international artists to boycott South African in 80s

Loved, loved, loved music and jazz in particular.

Here's a great article from 1986 recounting his 2/3 year journey making his makeshift saxophone & the role of music on Robben Island: https://learnandteach.org.za/1986/03/03/saxophone-in-chains/