Nyabêla's ancestors probably moved from the southeast coast of Africa to the Highveld in the sixteenth or seventeenth century and settled near the later Pretoria.

After many hardships, this part of the tribe went to live at a place along the Steelpoort River called KoNomtsharhelo.

They again waged war, but in 1865 peace was made when the Boers recognized that a much larger area belonged to the Mapoggers.

The commission consisted of Commandant-General Piet Joubert, the British Resident, one Hudson, and Hendrik Jacobus Schoeman, the Native Commissioner of Heidelberg and Pretoria.

Nyabêla was instructed by letter to meet the commission on October 6 on the farm of Dirk Stoffberg, just below Bothasberg.

Nyabêla was also requested to provide the commission with information on the number of huts, livestock and subjects.

According to Grové, who went to deliver the letter, Nyabêla angrily hit the ground with his staff and said: "Go and get Piet, and I will talk to him."

During their meeting that day, Grové reported that Nyabêla refused to come to Stoffberg and insisted that the commission should come to his stat.

To Trichard, the interpreter, Nyabêla asked: "Fanis, what are you doing here with your looted Englishman, why do you say to me this is one Captain, why did you not bring Piet?"

After that, Mampuru went into hiding in various places and launched attacks against chiefs who were sympathetic to the Boers or Sekhukhune.

While the commando was at Hoedspruit, Nyabêla's fighting general, Swaas, and his interpreter, Kleinbooi, arrived at the army.

He added that it was the duty of every citizen of the state to work together to uphold the law and punish murderers.

Joubert also warns Nyabêla what the consequences of his refusal could be for his tribe, namely that it would be seen as resistance and rebellion against the legal authority and that it would then be suppressed by force.

Riedl then issued a pass to them to visit the army the next morning and he left back to camp to report to the Commanding General.

On Sunday 5 November, the interpreter (Kleinbooi) and three other subordinates of Nyabêla arrive at one of the Boers' outposts, about half an hour on horseback from the main camp.

The messengers would have told the general that Nyabêla was afraid that Joubert would lock him up, as with Sekhukhune and Cetswayo happened.

Far north of the Mapoggers' heartland, one of the commandos attacked Mampoerskop on 5 December, but Mampuru escaped and fled to Makwanistat.

First, he sends messengers to persuade Native Commissioner SP Grové to act as mediator.

[25] By the end of June 1883, the Mapoggers were finally completely surrounded, destroying their fields and driving away their livestock.

On September 21, 1883, Nyabêla appeared before Judge JG Kotze and a jury of eight white men on the grounds that he was a subject of the South African Republic, illegally, maliciously, with premeditated and malicious intent, violated public peace and tranquility by resisting and defying the legitimate authority of the Republic, and taking up arms, carrying and using at the head of his armed sub-captains and his people, with the aim of resisting the legitimate authority of the ZAR.

[27] After reading the indictment, Advocate Cooper told the court that Nyabêla's defense would not be aimed at the facts in the indictment, but would primarily be that the relationship of state and subject between the Government of the ZAR and Nyabela did not exist and that Nyabela was always an independent captain.

Second, Ueckermann has a proclamation from Sir Hercules Robinson, in which he announced that the rights and obligations of all natives would remain the same after the signing of the Pretoria Convention.

Cooper argues that Nyabêla was not present when Sir Hercules addressed the chiefs and therefore the proclamation did not apply to him.

In any case, Kleinbooi testified that Nyabêla admitted to Shepstone that he was a "Government Supplier" and therefore had to pay return.

However, the defense had no effective answer to the state's argument that Nyabêla started the war by taking down the Boers' oxen.

Their names on the indictment were Matsitsi, Umbela, Magabalela, Elambies, Maboy, Magaloel, Maningi, T'komans, Boesman, Massloslobonka, Donnkolo alias Jonkman, Salempa, Pankalala, Makondoulo, Sekiti, Umlangoul, Umtmessa; Mandienda, Umbavi, Samokaloto, Mamoka and Wildebeest.

Paul Kruger meanwhile left for London for talks on amendments to the Pretoria Convention and Piet Joubert acted as state president.

After the judge summarized the facts and the arguments, he wrote that the law obliged him to pronounce the death sentence.

But General Joubert stated in his testimony that he had sent a message to Nyabêla that if he did not surrender, he would die of a bullet in the head or of starvation in a hole.

The Executive Council then decided to change Nyabêla's death sentence to life imprisonment with forced labor.