The truck that smuggled ANC weapons into South Africa

Liliesleaf Farm in the Rivonia suburb of Johannesburg was a site used by the African National Congress from which to launch its armed struggle against the apartheid state.

On 11 July 1963, leading ANC members were arrested there by the police - and went on to face what became known as the Rivonia Trial. Nelson Mandela and his colleagues were subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment.

The farm is now a museum - and one of the exhibits there is a Bedford truck that was used to take tourists on African safaris. But as Mike Wooldridge explains, the truck's real purpose was actually to transport weapons and ammunition to the ANC army inside South Africa - and the tourists on board were completely unaware of this.

  • Subsection
  • Published