Political suppression and the Treason Trial

• Suppression of Communism Act, 1950


  The government genuinely believed communist agitators were behind the majority of protest against apartheid. In suppressing communism too they were seen by the Western powers and USA in particular as a reliable ally in the Cold War.
• Definition of communism

  This act defined communism as any scheme aimed 'at bringing about any political and social and economic change within the Union by the promotion of disturbance and disorder'.

  • Communism was therefore a euphemism for any form of unrest, and the Act could be used to imprison anyone for anything the authorities deemed subversive.
  • It could also ban organisations and individuals from contacting others for periods of up to 5 years by the use of banning orders. For many, this meant house arrest.
• The Treason Trial, 1956-61

  Many different groups of all races had protested apartheid, and at a People's Congress in Kliptown in June 1955 drew up a Freedom Charter demanding equal rights for all in South Africa.

  18 months after the ratification of the Freedom Charter, on 5 December 1956, the authorities arrested 156 of those who had attended and charged them with high treason. Those arraigned included the entire leadership of the ANC and most of that of the other opposition groups. The treason trial dragged on for 5 years. Ending in March 1961.