[1]: Chp4 Between 1969 and 1981, the department was of an ad hoc nature with staff drawn mainly from Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the military wing of the ANC.
[1]: Chp4 In 1981 a new head of the Department of National Intelligence and Security was sought, based in Lusaka, Zambia with the job offered to Mzwai Piliso, the man responsible for setting up the ANC camps in Angola after 1975 and which housed the recruits who fled South Africa after 1976 Soweto riots.
[2]: 285 From 1981, the staffing was formalised with training in intelligence taking place in the Soviet Union, East Germany, Libya and Zimbabwe.
[1]: Chp4 It was used as detention and torture camp for those thought to have betrayed the ANC organisation to the South African government or those involved in common crime.
[3] The security section of NAT was called the Mbokodo, gaining an infamous reputation by stamping out any sign of dissent in the ANC camps and a need to find scapegoats whether real or imagined when things went wrong.