Boycott

The AAM celebrated its fifteenth anniversary with a ‘Freedom Convention’ at Camden Lock, London on 30 June 1974. Stalls displayed information about South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Portugal’s African colonies. A petition for the release of South African prisoners with 30,000 signatures was presented to Nigeria’s UN Ambassador Edwin Ogbu, Chair of the UN Special Committee Against Apartheid. The Convention also highlighted the call for a boycott of all South African products.

Poster asking shoppers to boycott South African goods. This was a reprint of a poster first produced in 1978. Some of the items incorporate images of the shootings of school students in Soweto in June 1976.

Leaflet asking shoppers to boycott South African goods. Many anti-apartheid groups produced leaflets like this for distribution in local shopping centres, drawing on lists of products and statistics supplied by the national AAM.

Many local AA groups produced their own leaflets, like this one asking shoppers in Haringey, north London to pressure Tesco into withdrawing South African products.

The far-right National Front in the north London borough of Haringey distributed this leaflet urging shoppers to buy South African goods to show their support for apartheid South Africa. The AAM met with virulent opposition from a succession of far-right organisations in Britain throughout its 35-year history.

Sticker produced by the far-right British National Party (BNP) asking people to support apartheid by buying South African goods. The AAM met with virulent opposition from a succession of far-right organisations in Britain throughout its 35-year history.

Poster published by the British Communist Party asking shoppers not to buy South African goods. From the formation of the Boycott Campaign in the summer of 1959 the Communist Party supported the boycott of South Africa. Its newspaper, the Morning Star, continued to give full coverage to Anti-Apartheid Movement demonstrations and campaigns. 

Southampton anti-apartheid supporters asked shoppers to boycott South African goods outside Safeways on 25 April 1981. The action was part of a national consumer boycott day, with action at 40 shopping centres throughout the country. Activists also collected signatures for a national sanctions petition launched on 21 March as part of the AAM’s ‘Isolate Apartheid South Africa – Sanctions Now!’ campaign. Seventy thousand people signed the petition.