Key topic 1

• National Party wins elections (1948)

  -Led by Malan

  -4 main reasons

  1)Economic

  • Smuts wanted to move towards integration (Afrikaner's livelyhood threatened)
  • Still were suffering economically from WWI

  2) Race

  • Eventually wanted Black politicians and integrated healthcare (convoluted)

  -Clear message -> Apartheid

  3) Campaign

  • Smuts seen as old and out of touch

  - Strong local branches (ex. Western Cape - traditionally UP)

  4) Vote proportionality

  -Rural consituenties weighed more heavily than urban (15% more)

  *NP actually lost popular vote
• Werner Eislen Report (1949)

  1. African culture to be protected & develop pastoral culture
  2. Curriculum should include only limited skills needed for cheap labour
  3. Need a Bantu Education Council
• Extension of Voters (1949)

  • SA protectorate, Namibia, allowed to vote in elections
  • Giving the NP 6 new seats

  (how the NP maintained control)
• ~Defiance Campaign (1952)~

  • Non-violent protest led by ANC

  1. Local protests (ex. disrespect pass laws)
  2. (Mass defiance and nationalised strikes)

  • NP didn't care

  ~Membership rose from 4,000 - 100,000 by 1953
• Freedom Charter (1955)

  • Between ANC and other key organisations (SACPU)
  • Drafted a proposal to reflect views of Africans
  • Was very tolerant and called for equality without revenge

  -> 156 members put on the Treason Trial (1956-61)
• ~Women's Pass Protest (1956)~

  • 20,000 women marched on Petroria with pettition signed by 100,000
  • 1,000 women protested in Lithenburg (3 killed)
• ~Zeerust Uprising (1957)~

  • Mass arrests
• ~Potato Boycott (1957-59)~

  • Refused to buy potatoes b/c of horrible working conditions

  + Slightly better conditions for potato farmers
• Treason Trial (1956-61)

  • 156 members of the freedom charter arrested for high treason
  • All members were eventually aquitted due to a lack of evidence
• `Sharpville Massacre (1960)`

  • 40% of the population below 18 (idealistic)
  • New police station built in 1959
  • ANC organises pass protests, so PAC rushes to organise one before them

  21st of March

  • 5,000-20,000 peaceful, passless protestors
  • 400 policemen started shooting

  *69 killed (70% in back)*

  March 30th - State of emergency & 10,000 arrests

  - Police even rampaged through hospitals to arrest injured
• ~Direct Action (1960)~

  • ANC's final peaceful protest in response to the Sharpville Massacre
• ~Creation of Umkhontowe Sizwe - MK (1962)

  -> ANC's paramilitary wing

  Created because of Sharpville Massacre and the NPs refusal to listen to peaceful means (gained public support)

  • Bombed government buildings
  • 200 attacks in first 18 months
• Ravonia Trial (1963-64)

  • Implicated the majority of ANC leadership
  • 250 documents incriminating Nelson Mandela found at Lilliesleaf farm
  • Pleaded guilty and used it to publise their cause

  - Highlight was a 4 hour speech from Mandela

  • Sentenced to life on Robben Island (not made martyrs)

  ~ End to MK activity

  ~ ANC had to operate in exile
• ARM bomb Johannesburg (1964)

  • African Resitance Movement - a white opposition group
  • 1 person killed
  • John Harris (perpretrator) hanged
• Verwoerd assasination (1966)

  -> by a white member of SACP

  Vorster took over

  • Vorster had been Justice secretary 1961-66
  • Increased defence spending from 44 millin to 225 million rand
• Compulsory Conscription to SADF (1967)
• SASO created (1968)

  • By Steve Biko

  'Black man, you are on your own'
• BOSS set up (1969)

  Bureau of State Security

  Created by Vorster to:

  1. Coordinate SADF, police, and quaisi legal forces
  2. Secret and repoted dirctly to Vorster
• ~Morogo Conference (1969)~

  • Reorganised the ANC's leadership structure
  • Whites allowed, but not in top positions
• Oil Crisis (1973)

  • price of gold drops
  • Government spending on Black education drops to 0.5% of GDP
• The World *6 sales (1962-75)
• Afrikaner made compulsory in schools (1974)
• SOWETO uprising (June 1976)

  Event:

  • Peaceful march organised by SASO and SASM
  • Police opened fire -> pandemonium
  • Students dispersed and contnued to loot the township

  - 3 killed at initial shooting, up to 200 in total (only 23 reported though)

  - Hector Peterson
• SOWETO uprising (June 1976)

  Government immidiate response:

  • 18 organisations banned
  • 18 different methods of torture to extract information
  • 52,000 arrests
  • 90 banning orders
• TV introduced (1976)
• Steve Biko assasination (1977)

  • Given a banning order in 1973 + arrested 29 times
  • Died in prison from police brutality

  - Government refused to take responsibility

  • Inspired the 'Cry Freedom' movie
• PW Botha (1978)

  • Believed communist brough "Total Onslaught'
  • Met this with 'Total Strategy'

  1. State Security Council established: quasi legal police force
  2. Armed Forces: Increased mandatory service to 2 years
  3. Arms Industry: increased government spending from 700 mil- 3 bil rand by 1981
• Muldergate Scandal (1978)

  Connie Mulder caught embesseling taxpayer money

  1. R64 million for illegal activities
  2. R30 million to buy newspaper The Citizen
  3. Paid bribes to international officials
  4. Own use

  -> Vorster forced to step down

  -Created Conservative party in 1982
• State Security Council (1979)

  • Army generals and police chiefs to coordinate security
  • Secret operations: infiltrations, bombing, and assasinations
• Weihann Report (1979)

  1. African unions should be registered with the government
  2. Black unions gained access to the industrial court
  3. Black union had the right to strike (with 30 days notice)

  - Government had the right to refuse unions (only accepted unions associated with white ones)

  - Black SA still arrested for strikes (ex. 1,000 deported in Johannessburg 1980)
• Riekert Commission (1979)

  To aid in skilled worker shortage

  • Black SA with specific skills recieved preferncial treatment
  • Called the section 10 rights
  • 1/2 million benifitted (of 18 million total)

  - White people who employed illegal labour now arrested and fined

  - Amount of deportees actually increased
• Township improvement under Botha

  • electricity and sewage provided
  • 30 year leases on township homes
  • Purchasing of homes allowed from 1983

  By 1979, 68% of 'migrant' workers were now stable residents
• UDF United Democratic Front (1983)

  • Conglomerate of 500 anti-apartheid organisations
  • *Leaderless organisation*
  • Powerbase was in trade unions so many strikes
  • Affliliated group: COSAS (Congress of South African Stundents)

  - Liberation now, education later

  • Mass petitions (> 1 million signatures)
• Rent Boycott incident (1984)

  • Lekao: rent R10 above national average + low wages
  • Deputy mayor (Dlamini) was te highest paid resident in Sharpville

  1. Dlamini's house got stonned
  2. Dlamini opened fire on the protestors
  3. Dlamini dragged out of his house, petroled and set on fire
• Negotiations with FRELIMO (1984)

  • Removal of the ANC base
• Cradock 4 (June 1985)

  • 4 active members of the UDF & ANC
  • Went missing after a UDF meeting at night
  • 4 burnt bodies with stab wounds found the morning after (off the road)
  • Police inquest did not take responsibiltiy (1987)
  • Funeral attended by over 60,000 (had messages from Tambo)

  - Botha declares a State of emergency in Eastern Cape

  - UDF leaders deatined and tortured
• 25th anniversary of Sharpville (1985)

  • 17 killed in a peaceful march
• Rubicorn Speech (1985)

  • Widely anticipated worldwide with over 200 million listeners
  • Botha refused to change his strategy - 'my government will press ahead'
• Eminent Person's Report (1986)

  • Commonwealth nations condemned SA
• WHAM (1985/6)

  1. Repealed Mixed Marriages Act (1985)
  2. Local amenities encouraged to desegregate (optional)
  3. Pass laws abolished (1986)

  -Grand apartheid continued