African Activist Archive

Contents: Happy Birthday - ANC • Northeastern Regional Free Southern Africa Conference, New Haven, Connecticut - September 17-18, 1988 • 1988 - Year of South African Culture • Martin Luther King, opponent of apartheid • Southern Africa Solidarity Tour • Will Namibia Be Free in 1989? • NAMIBIA: Apartheid's Other Country by New York Labor Committee Against Apartheid • The newsletter says the African National Congress (ANC) was founded 77 years ago in 1912; while most other countries in Africa have been decolonized since then, South Africa and Namibia remain the last bastion of racist, minority rule. The newsletter says the ANC initially relied on nonviolent resistance to achieve its goals; however, the petitions, rallies, boycotts and other passive resistance strategies were met by even greater political and economic repression, along with brute force. After a period of agitation and struggle in the 1950s, i.e. the "defiance campaign" and drafting of the Freedom Charter, many leading members of the ANC were put in prison and eventually the organization was "banned." The newsletter says under these circumstances, the ANC decided they had no other choice than to launch an armed struggle to overthrow the racist government. The newsletter includes excerpts from a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr. at Hunter College, on Human Rights Day, December 10, 1965. The newsletter says from August 5 to 27, 1988, two Rhode Islanders, Joseph Newsome (co-chair of RI Divest) and Rev. Roy Fralin (District Superintendent, United Methodist Church) toured Zaire, Kenya, Zambia and Zimbabwe with three other people from Pennsylvania. The newsletter says the "Mandela Birthday Concert" at Wembley Stadium in London in June was the largest concert ever held in solidarity with a single political prisoner, and it was watched by millions around the world. The newsletter says on December 22, 1988, a multilateral agreement to end South Africa's illegal occupation of Namibia was signed at the U.N.; the agreement, known as the Brazzaville Accord, was worked out over seven months of intense face-to-face negotiations between Angola, Cuba, South Africa and the U.S. (as mediator). The newsletter mentions Senator Lowell Weicker (R-Connecticut), sanctions, SWAPO (Southwest African People's Organization), the Frontline States, Hugh Masakela, Miriam Makeba, Atiba Mbiwan, "Cry Freedom," "A World Apart," Spike Lee's "School Daze," "Sarafina," music, Jonathan Butler, colonialism, the U.S. policy of "constructive engagement," Comas Chanda, the Makeni Refugee Camp in Zambia, Rev. James McJuncken, Honorable Canaan Banana, Rev. Fumanekile Gqiba, the Reagan administration, Chester Crocker, David Reed, the San Francisco Anti-Apartheid Committee, Cuban troops, and the Labor Against Apartheid Newsletter.

African Activist Archive

UPDATE: R.I. Divest's Community Newsletter

Edition

Creator

Place Created

Date

Type of Item

Length/duration

Description

Organization

Coverage Africa

Language

Digital Format

Rights Management

Collection