Issue 57 outlines the intensifying political repression in South Africa and Namibia during early 1985. It highlights escalating political trials, over 1,100 detentions in 1984, censorship and state raids on press agencies, the trial of SWAPO fighters under repressive conditions, and the growing use of the Internal Security Act. The issue reports on community resistance, school boycotts, labour union suppression, press censorship, and constitutional manipulation to preserve apartheid structures. It includes detailed trial summaries, prisoner lists, and coverage of Nelson Mandela’s conditional release rejection.

Issue 54 details condemnations of Namibian security legislation, torture and overcrowding in prisons, living conditions for Black Namibians, mass arrests of SWAPO leaders, ongoing township protests in South Africa, youth and student trials, and political detentions under apartheid. It features extensive evidence from the Namibian Bar Council challenging the legitimacy and brutality of the state's policing and detention laws, while also documenting high-profile trials and growing resistance movements.