African Activist Archive

Individualized letter to ACAS Board member Bill Minter with a letter from Allen Isaacman addressed to prospective ACAS members. Isaacman asks Board members to send the letter with a personal note to ten contacts to try to revitalize the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (ACAS). The letter talks about the need to challenge the Reagan Administration's Africa policy - in the Sahara, Zaire, Angola, and the Indian Ocean. This policy uses food as a political weapon and cuddles the racist regime of South Africa. ACAS activities include sending petitions with more than 800 signatures protesting the illegal detainment in Zaire of Professor Ernest Wamba-Dia-Wamba both to President Mobutu and the U.S. State Department. Also, ACAS was involved in the Dennis Brutus Defense Campaign and protested plans to expel Ethiopian students from the U.S. Most of ACAS' activity centered on South Africa: opposing the Reagan administration's relaxing of export control regarding military technology and computers, opposing allowing South African Airways (SAA) to open a new route from Johannesburg to Houston, participating in the campaign to demand that three ANC militants and be accorded full rights under the Geneva accord for political prisoners, joining protests of the Rugby tours, and protested the recent International Monetary Fund substantial loan to South Africa. ACAS also wrote to several map companies stating that their new maps which depict "Bantustans" as independent countries and ex-Spanish Sahara as part of Morocco were inaccurate and would not be considered for classroom use by our members. The mailing mentions South African efforts to destabilize Mozambique, Sharon Sopher, "Blood and Sand: War in the Sahara," and the African Studies Association (ASA).

African Activist Archive

[Dear Bill: As part of our effort to recruit new ACAS members while simultaneously decentralizing the Secretariat, I am asking you to send a copy of the enclosed letter …]

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