Steven Bantu Biko
Date of birth: 18 December 1946, King William's
Town, Eastern Cape, South Africa
Date of death: 12 September 1977, Pretoria prison cell, South Africa
Date of death: 12 September 1977, Pretoria prison cell, South Africa
Steve Biko was one of South Africa's most significant
political activists and a leading founder of South Africa's Black Consciousness
Movement. His death in police detention in 1977 led to his being hailed as a
martyr of the anti-Apartheid struggle.
Biko and Black Consciousness
In 1972 Biko was one of the founders of the Black Peoples Convention (BPC) working on social upliftment projects around Durban. The BPC effectively brought together roughly 70 differentblack consciousness groups and associations, such as the South African Student's Movement (SASM), which played a significant role in the 1976 uprisings, the National Association of Youth Organisations, and the Black Workers Project which supported black workers whose unions were not recognized under the Apartheid regime. Biko was elected as the first president of the BPC and was promptly expelled from medical school. He started working full time for the Black Community Programme (BCP) in Durban which he also helped found.
In 1972 Biko was one of the founders of the Black Peoples Convention (BPC) working on social upliftment projects around Durban. The BPC effectively brought together roughly 70 differentblack consciousness groups and associations, such as the South African Student's Movement (SASM), which played a significant role in the 1976 uprisings, the National Association of Youth Organisations, and the Black Workers Project which supported black workers whose unions were not recognized under the Apartheid regime. Biko was elected as the first president of the BPC and was promptly expelled from medical school. He started working full time for the Black Community Programme (BCP) in Durban which he also helped found.
Banned by the Apartheid Regime
In 1973 Steve Biko was 'banned' by the Apartheid government. Under the 'ban' Biko was restricted to his home town of Kings William's Town in the Eastern Cape – he could no longer support the BCP in Durban, but was able to continue working for the BPC – he helped set up the Zimele Trust Fund which assisted political prisoners and their families. (Biko was elected Honorary President of the BPC in January 1977.)
In 1973 Steve Biko was 'banned' by the Apartheid government. Under the 'ban' Biko was restricted to his home town of Kings William's Town in the Eastern Cape – he could no longer support the BCP in Durban, but was able to continue working for the BPC – he helped set up the Zimele Trust Fund which assisted political prisoners and their families. (Biko was elected Honorary President of the BPC in January 1977.)
Biko Dies in Detention
Biko was detained and interrogated four times between August 1975 and September 1977 under Apartheid era anti-terrorism legislation. On 21 August 1977 Biko was detained by the Eastern Cape security police and held in Port Elizabeth. From the Walmer police cells he was taken for interrogation at the security police headquarters. On 7 September "Biko sustained a head injury during interrogation, after which he acted strangely and was uncooperative. The doctors who examined him (naked, lying on a mat and manacled to a metal grille) initially disregarded overt signs of neurological injury."1
Biko was detained and interrogated four times between August 1975 and September 1977 under Apartheid era anti-terrorism legislation. On 21 August 1977 Biko was detained by the Eastern Cape security police and held in Port Elizabeth. From the Walmer police cells he was taken for interrogation at the security police headquarters. On 7 September "Biko sustained a head injury during interrogation, after which he acted strangely and was uncooperative. The doctors who examined him (naked, lying on a mat and manacled to a metal grille) initially disregarded overt signs of neurological injury."1
By 11 September Biko had slipped into a continual,
semi-conscious state and the police physician recommended a transfer to
hospital. Biko was, however, transported 1,200 km to Pretoria – a 12-hour
journey which he made lying naked in the back of a Land Rover. A few hours
later, on 12 September, alone and still naked, lying on the floor of a cell in
the Pretoria Central Prison, Biko died from brain damage.
The Apartheid Government's Response
The South African Minister of Justice, James (Jimmy) Kruger initially suggested Biko had died of a hunger-strike and said that his death "left him cold". The hunger strike story was dropped after local and international media pressure, especially from Donald Woods, the editor of the East London Daily Dispatch. It was revealed in the inquest that Biko had died of brain damage, but the magistrate failed to find anyone responsible, ruling that Biko had died as a result of injuries sustained during a scuffle with security police whilst in detention.
The South African Minister of Justice, James (Jimmy) Kruger initially suggested Biko had died of a hunger-strike and said that his death "left him cold". The hunger strike story was dropped after local and international media pressure, especially from Donald Woods, the editor of the East London Daily Dispatch. It was revealed in the inquest that Biko had died of brain damage, but the magistrate failed to find anyone responsible, ruling that Biko had died as a result of injuries sustained during a scuffle with security police whilst in detention.
An Anti-Apartheid Martyr
The brutal circumstances of Biko's death caused a worldwide outcry and he became a martyr and symbol of black resistance to the oppressive Apartheid regime. As a result, the South African government banned a number of individuals (including Donald Woods) and organizations, especially those Black Consciousness groups closely associated with Biko. The United Nations Security Council responded by finally imposing an arms embargo against South Africa.
The brutal circumstances of Biko's death caused a worldwide outcry and he became a martyr and symbol of black resistance to the oppressive Apartheid regime. As a result, the South African government banned a number of individuals (including Donald Woods) and organizations, especially those Black Consciousness groups closely associated with Biko. The United Nations Security Council responded by finally imposing an arms embargo against South Africa.
Date of Death: August
19th 2001, aged 67
Donald Woods, who cried for freedom was a white South
African who became famous by speaking for a black South African, Steve Biko,
who believed that a white should never speak for South Africa's blacks. The
relationship between Donald Woods and Steve Biko provided one of the many
paradoxes that apartheid threw up.
The tool of law
Donald Woods was
born at Elliotdale, Transkei, South Africa, in 1933 not far from Nelson
Mandela's birthplace. Woods started out life like most white South
Africans-amid wealth, privilege, and totally ignorant of their all-pervasive
racism. Initially, he viewed blacks as inferior and "easily accepted the
general white attitude that colour and race were the determinants of the chasms
in culture. Woods had grown up close to black people. His father was a
trader who dealt with blacks, and Donald spoke the local language, Xhosa,
fluently. Still, as a young man, he recalled later, he had no problem with
seeing “blacks as inferior” and “easily accepted the general white attitude
that colour and race were the determinants of the chasms in culture.” He
studied law at Cape Town university, a training that was to help him in his
court battles with the government. He stood for parliament for the liberal
Federal Party. When he lost he turned to journalism, joining the Daily
Dispatch, later gaining experience in Europe, then returning to the Dispatch where
he was eventually made editor.
He became the first private citizen to address the United
Nations Security Council and he briefed the then United States president, Jimmy
Carter, on what he should do about South Africa. Despite the impact that Mr Biko had made on his
life he still sounded like a white liberal. Indeed, Oliver Tambo, then
president of the African National Congress (ANC), urged him not to join the
movement but to remain a detached commentator. Mr Woods could explain to the
outside world what it was like to be on the receiving end of apartheid. He and
the film “Cry Freedom” helped to change the western view of apartheid. Mr Woods
said it was evil and he was believed. As well as “Biko” he wrote “Asking For
Trouble”, an autobiography, and most recently “Rainbow Nation Revisited”, about
South Africa's first ten years of democracy.
There were 317 Apartheid Laws in South Africa during the Apartheid Era.
History of South Africa in the apartheid era ( from Wikipedia)
Apartheid, which means "apartness" or "separateness" in Afrikaans, was a system of racial segregation that operated in South Africa from 1948 to the early 1990s. Under apartheid, the races, classified by law into White, Black, Indian, and Coloured groups, were separated, each with their own homelands and institutions. In practice this prevented non-white people, even if actually resident in white South Africa, from having a vote or influence, restricting their rights to faraway homelands of poor-quality lands which they may never have visited. Education, medical care and other public services were sometimes claimed to be separate but equal, but those available to non-white people were in fact inferior.
The Immorality Act
Mixed Marriages and the Immorality Act became the first major pieces of apartheid legislation. In 1949 mixed marriages were banned in South Africa. In 1950 the act was followed up with a ban on sexual relations between blacks and whites. One of the first people convicted of the immorality act was a Cape Dutch Reformed minister; he was caught having sex with a domestic worker in his garage. He was given a suspended sentence and the parishioners bulldozed the garage to the ground.On the grounds of the Immorality Act, the police tracked down mixed couples suspected of being in relationships. Homes were invaded and doors were smashed down in the process. Mixed couples caught in bed were arrested. Underwear was used as forensic evidence in court. Most couples found guilty were sent to jail. Blacks were often given harsher sentences than whites. Between 1950 and 1985, there were more than 24,000 prosecutions and 11,614 convictions. (Apartheid A Graphic Guide)
In 1985 the Immorality Act and Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act were both repealed.
The Population Registration Act of 1950 required that all inhabitants of South Africa be classified in accordance with their racial characteristics as part of the system of apartheid. Social rights, political rights, educational opportunities, and economic status were largely determined by which group an individual belonged to.
There were three basic racial classifications under the law: Black, White and Coloured (Mixed). Asian (that is, South Asians from the former British India) was later added as a separate classification as they were seen as having "no historical right to the country".The South African Parliament repealed the act on June 17, 1991.
The Group Areas Act of 1950 (Act No. 41 of 1950) was an act of parliament created under the Apartheid government of South Africa that assigned races to different residential and business sections in urban areas. This led to people being forcibly removed for living in the "wrong" areas. 84% of the land was designated for Whites only, although Whites made up barely 15% of the population. 2% was reserved for either Coloureds or Indians (Asians), while 14% was for Blacks who made up over 80% of the population. (from Apartheid A Graphic Guide by Donald Woods)
This act was finally repealed 41 years later, on June 5, 1991 — at the same time as the Land Act of 1913
Bantu Education Act of 1953 was a South African law which codified several aspects of the apartheid system. Its major provisions included:
- enforced separation of races in all educational institutions. Even universities were made 'tribal', and many mission schools had to close.
- permitted any person in charge of any public premises or public vehicle to reserve them for the exclusive use of any race.
- outlawed strikes by African workers.
- 5 years imprisonment and/or ten lashes for anyone causing anyone else to break the law in protest against the apartheid laws, as the direct result of the Defiance Campaign.
- gave powers to the government to declare a state of emergency and suspend Parliament and the courts.
- no science or mathematics was taught under Bantu education, emphasis was placed on agriculture.
(the following comes from Apartheid A Graphic Guide by Donald Woods)
The Separate Amenities Act legislated for the strict segregation of all public facilities, such as parks, beaches, bus stops, swimming pools, sports grounds, theatres, and cinemas. A Black nursemaid could be on a "White" beach if she was looking after children, but she could not go in the water herself except in case of emergency. Also, Blacks could enter a White church to clean it but not to pray in it.
The Railway Act and Road Transportation Act legislated for trains, buses, and taxis to be racially segregated, though it was permissible for a Black man to drive a taxi reserved for Whites. Ambulances, health services, hospitals, and clinics were all segregated.
When Professor Dennis Brutus, a Coloured man, was wounded while trying to evade political arrest, he lay bleeding on the sidewalk for 25 minutes because the first ambulance summoned was reserved for Whites, and a second ambulance reserved for Coloureds had to be sent for.
Job Reservation Laws reserved certain jobs for certain race groups. A Black construction worker could hammer nails into planks with the front of the hammer, but could not use its claw to extract nails because that was considered more refined work reserved for Coloured and White artisans.
The Factories Act required the owners of every new factory to provide a separate toilet for workers in each race group.
Pass Laws made it compulsory for Blacks to carry passport-sized booklets at all times, containing documentary permission to be in a White area for a certain amount of time. Failure to do so resulted in imprisonment. In 1984, it was decided as a concession that Black marathon runners could run through a White area if they had a photocopy of the main page of their pass book pinned to their vests.
A Banned Person could be/have
- imprisoned without trial
- sent to any other part of the country
- followed and watched by police 24 hours a day
- forbidden to speak in public
- forbidden to travel
- forbidden to be in a room with more than one person at a time (excluding immediate family)
- forbidden to attend or join any organization
- forbidden to protest or oppose any government policy
- their passport taken away from them
- their home or any other premises searched without a warrant
- their home electronically bugged
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