‘Don’t Buy South African goods’ was the message on Tyneside AA Group’s float at Newcastle upon Tyne’s May Day carnival in 1989. Local anti-apartheid supporters were asking spectators to support the AAM’s ‘Boycott Apartheid 89’ campaign.
Tyneside AA Group asked carnival goers to support the AAM’s ‘Boycott Apartheid 89’ campaign on May Day 1989.
Trade unionists from Teesside and Hartlepool protested against the unloading of South African coal at Teesport in north-east England on 11 May 1989. British miners and other trade unionists were at the forefront of the campaign against imports of South African coal. By the late 1980s the international campaign meant that it was often sold at a discounted price.
In December 1988 South Africa signed the UN Plan for the Independence of Namibia, which led to the holding of free elections in November 1989. With the Namibia Support Committee, the AAM set up the Namibia Emergency Campaign (NEC) to mobilise British support for Namibian independence and solidarity with the South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO). On 13 May 1989 the NEC held a conference where 200 delegates were briefed by SWAPO Labour Secretary Jason Angula.
Early in 1989 more than 300 South African detainees went on hunger strike in protest against their detention without trial. Altogether over 1,000 people were held without charge, some of them for over two years. The ANC held a solidarity vigil outside South Africa House and Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society asked British Foreign Office Minister Lynda Chalker to tell the South African ambassador that his government must release the detainees.
The Upington 14 were sentenced to death on 26 May 1989 because they were present at a demonstration during which a black policeman was killed. They included a 60-year old woman, Evelyn de Bruin. Anti-apartheid supporters picketed the South African Embassy in London calling for clemency for the Upington 14. After an international campaign for their release, the sentence was overturned in May 1991.
The AAM held its first women only conference on 3 June 1989, following a Month of Action in March, which publicised the impact of apartheid on South African women. All over Britain, women held meetings, exhibitions and benefit concerts.
Anti-apartheid supporters protested at Downing Street on the eve of President F W de Klerk’s visit to Britain in June 1989.
