BCLSA Newsletter

Contents: ELEVEN SOWETO STUDENTS TRIED • KRUGERRAND DEALER PICKETED • ZIMBABWE-THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES • HARVARD STUDENTS FIGHT APARTHEID • NEW PREMIER FOR SOUTH AFRICA • BOSTON UNIVERSITY STUDENTS ORGANIZE • WINNIE MANDELA INSPIRES ACTION • WORLD COUNCIL OF CHURCHES ATTACKED • BLACK COMMUNITY DESTROYED • CLOTHING DRIVE • IAN SMITH IN AMERICA? • SISTER, BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A BUCK? • The newsletter says September 25 was the opening day of the trial of 11 members of the Soweto Students Representative Council; the group is composed of 10 men and one woman, all were high school students at the time of the Soweto Rebellion in 1976; the students are charged with sedition or terrorism, have no option for bail, and a guilty verdict on either count has a maximum penalty of death. The newsletter says September 12 was the first anniversary of Steve Biko's death at the hands of the South African police; to mark the event, Boston groups working on Southern Africa sponsored a picket of LeBlanc's Numismatics (a coin dealership) in downtown Boston; LeBlanc continues to sell the South African gold coin, the Krugerrand, while displaying three advertisements to that effect in his small storefront window. The newsletter says the "internal settlement" has virtually collapsed and white Rhodesia is under heavier siege than ever before the "internal settlement" was instituted. The newsletter says the Harvard-Radcliffe Southern Africa Solidarity Committee (SASC) is gearing up f o r the second year of its campaign to get Harvard to call for complete corporate withdrawal from South Africa; already this year, SASC, together with the organizations making up the United Front, has shown "Last Grave at Dimbaza" to 225 students and held a successful introductory meeting attended by 120 members of the Harvard Community. The newsletter says the National Party in South Africa has selected its Defense Minister, Pieter Botha, to be the new Prime Minister to succeed ailing John Vorster. The newsletter says his month the Boston University Southern Africa Support Committee (SASC) began meeting for its second semester of activity; though last spring the committee focused mainly on its own education, it anticipates this year to actively confront the administration with demands for divestment. The newsletter says South Africa's pass laws and Bantustan policy make it illegal for all but employed Blacks to live in South African cities; even families of workers are excluded from urban quareas and must live in rural areas far from their employed relatives; in defiance of these unjust and inhumane laws Black families built themselves a community known as Crossroads, outside of Cape Town. The newsletter says the Jamaica Plain Coalition for the Liberation of Southern Africa has started a clothing drive to send to the Patriotic Front to help the people of Zimbabwe who are fighting for liberation; the clothing will go to Mozambique and Zambia, where thousands of Zimbabwean refugees are living in camps. The newsletter discusses the Soweto 11, the Black Consciousness Movement, apartheid, Rhodesian troops, Ian Smith, Muzorewa, Sithole, Chirau, mercenaries, the guerrilla struggle, the Selous Scouts, P.W. Botha, SWAPO, the UN Special Committee Against Apartheid, sanctions, V.P. Muyongo, Nelson Mandela, Robben Island, the Winnie Mandela Coalition, First National Bank of Boston (FNBB), International Women's Day, human rights, liberation movements, Modderdam, freedom fighters, and the South African Police (SAP).