unitex@rubbs.fidonet.org (unitex) (09/17/89)
SOUTH AFRICA: Current Campaign Is In Defiance Tradition
Cape Town, September 7, 1989 (AIA/Sylvia Vollenhoven) -- The
defiance campaign which has overshadowed the September 6
election for a whites-only parliament has reaffirmed a
traditional form of protest against apartheid here.
In 1906, Mohandas Karamchad Gandhi organised the first act of
political defiance against the Transvaal government with the
launch of the passive resistance campaign against the
carrying of passes by Indians.
In the next three years around 2,500 people went to jail
rather than take out registration certificates. Then in
1913 the women of South Africa rose up against the law that
required them to carry passes.
Hundreds of black women all over the country took the
initiative from the men - for whom passes had previously
been declared compulsory - and presented themselves for
arrests at police stations all over South Africa.
A year after the National Party came to power in 1948, the
African National Congress (ANC) took the initiative further
and called for non-cooperation with government institutions,
and for boycotts, strikes and general civil disobedience. The
mood of resistance spread with the launch of the first
Defiance Campaign of 1952 when pass laws were defied,
whites-only signs on public facilities ignored and the
permit system for entering certain areas was flouted.
Those arrested chose jail instead of the option of a fine.
The anti-pass campaign spread all over the country and in
1955 about 20,000 women marched on the Union Buildings in
the capital city of Pretoria to demand to see the Prime
Minister.
The wave of peaceful protest ended tragically years later, on
March 21 1960, with the massacre of 69 people in the
Transvaal township of Sharpeville.
In the aftermath of the Sharpeville shootings the main black
political organisations were banned, state repression
intensified and anti-government resistance was at an all-
time low until the late '60s, when the black South African
Students' Organisation (SASO) was formed.
The current campaign of defiance, which kicked off with
hundreds of black people demanding treatment at white
hospitals early in August, has its roots in the original
campaigns.
---
* Origin: AlterNet, Node1 (Opus 1:163/113)
---
Patt Haring | United Nations | FAX: 212-787-1726
patth@sci.ccny.cuny.edu | Information | BBS: 201-795-0733
patth@ccnysci.BITNET | Transfer Exchange | (3/12/24/9600 Baud)
-=- Every child smiles in the same language. -=-