TODAY IN HISTORY

1986: SACP secretary-general and MK commander Moses Mabhida, pictured, dies of a heart attack in Maputo. 1994: Tensions in Bophuthatswana rise after the homeland government decides against registering for the April election, with police vehicles set alight, ANC offices petrol-bombed and police teargassing striking public servants. 2004: Fifteen suspected mercenaries, many of them South African, are arrested in Equatorial Guinea on suspicion of being part of a coup plot. The previous day Zimbabwean authorities had seized a plane in Harare carrying 64 suspected mercenaries.