TBH Terrorism is in the eye of the beholder. To the Aparthied people in power he was a "terrorist".
There is no doubt he was a communist, thats not even debatable. He was a leader in the SACP.
He did try to overthrow the government (a government that was pretty despicable, i mean aparthied is pretty bad, I equate it to worse than this countries civil rights movement. AP was worse than the south in the 1700s-1900s.
I think you can respect him as a person who fought to end racial segregation and fight for equality even though it was more under the socialist/communist political flag. We disagree politically, but I dont disagree with the equality on the matter.
my .02