ZAMDELA. – Booi died in the Groenpunt Correctional Facility formerly known as Stoffberg Prison before he was buried as pauper. This is after he was sentenced to two years for political activism.
His daughter, Nombulelo Booi (75), said that her father started serving a one-year term at Robben Island before being transported to Stoffberg. Family, friends, and comrades witnessed as his remains were being exhumed. Nombulelo, with tears on her face said:
“I can hear his voice talking and laughing. It will take ages for his memory to fade. My father was everything to his family. My father was an ANC activist. He loved the ANC, he lived for the ANC, he was arrested for the ANC. He died for the ANC because he hated apartheid.”
Booi was first arrested in 1961 for his involvement in ANC politics and he apparently started getting ill after being arrested, tortured, and sentenced to Robben Island. A year later he died before completing his remaining sentence in Groenpunt (Stoffberg) in 1966. The National Prosecuting Authority’s (NPA) Missing Persons Task Team tracked Booi’s movement from Robben Island to Groenpunt (Stoffberg) Prison. Forensic experts battled to remove his wooden coffin that was damaged, and only steel handles could be seen.
His remains (bones) were neatly packed in a brown bag to be taken to his final destination in Eastern Cape.
