The black conciousness movement in the 1970s 9.1

THE BLACK CONCIOUSNESS

MOVEMENT IN THE 1970s

The banning of the African National Congress (ANC) and the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) in the early 1960s had left a power vacuum in South Africa for a black liberation movement. This was filled by the formation of the Black Consciousness Movement, founded and led by Steve Biko.

Background

Bantu Stephen Biko was born in King William’s Town on 18 December 1946. He completed his primary schooling in King William’s Town, and then attended Marianhill Secondary School in KwaZulu.

He entered the Medical School of the University of Natal (Black Section) in 1966. He was elected to the Students’ Representative Council of that university, and attended a congress of the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS) in 1968.

NUSAS was a predominantly white student body. Biko, together with other black delegates, felt ill at ease there, as there did not appear to be much opportunity in NUSAS to address black frustrations.

As a result, Biko championed an all-black university student movement. This led to the creation of the South African Students’ Organisation (SASO) in July 1969, with Biko as its first president.

At first, the government supported this apparently voluntary system of apartheid, but as criticism of the government grew stronger, it started to act against SASO members.

Black Consciousness, which promoted the dignity and integrity of black people, appealed to many South Africans. The image of black people had been presented in an extremely negative manner in South Africa to the extent that many black people closely identified with white society in order to feel accepted.

The challenge was for black people to redevelop their history and image in a way that would make black people proud.

Black Consciousness was based on the conviction that black liberation would be achieved through black effort, not through reliance on the efforts of white liberals, who could not be as committed to the cause as blacks themselves.

In 1972, these ideas were carried into politics by means of the Black People's Convention. It called on black people to unite because they were being oppressed, exploited and discriminated against.

Leaders such as Steve Biko, Mapetla Mohapi and Mthuli ka Shezi urged black people to accept their identity, to unite in the struggle, and not to fear the whites or to imitate them. They also did not want white people to direct the liberation struggle.

Biko gave up the prospect of what could have been a comfortable and affluent life as a doctor in order to work for the liberation of his people. He took great joy in talking to the people about Black Consciousness and he travelled throughout the country putting forward his ideas.

Through his inspiration, the youth of high school, level was mobilised and this resulted in the formation of the South African Students’ Movement (SASM). As in other parts of the world, the youth are often more radical and more amenable to new ideas than the older generations.

This movement played an important role in the 1976 uprisings.

Biko was involved in the formation of the National Association of Youth Organisations (NAYO), which catered for the youth, and was instrumental in the formation of one of SASO’s projects, the Black Workers’ Project (BWP), which was co-sponsored by the black community.

Although extremely influential, Biko was severely restricted by the South African authorities. He was first banned in 1973, and was viewed with suspicion by the authorities because of his ideas and because of the influence of the ideas of the Black Consciousness Movement on the 1976 Soweto uprising.

On August 1977, Biko was arrested in a police roadblock with his colleague Peter Cyril Jones, and detained under Section 6 of the Terrorism Act. They had been to Cape Town to lend their weight to efforts to get all political organisations to agree to a broader programme of co-operation in order to advance the course of black liberation.

Biko finally died in September 1977 after havaing been tortured by the Security police. The Minister of Justice, Jimmy Kruger, in a callous remark, stated that ‘his death leaves me cold’.

Although he tried to explain his remark away over the years , it became a lasting mark of the lack of feeling of the apartheid system, which stripped people of their dignity.

News of Biko’s death was received with shock and horror in the African community and throughout the world. In October 1977, Kruger banned all organiasations connected with Black Consciousness, such as SASO and the Black People’s Convention.