1970

11 June, It is announced that Security Police have arrested the leader of the Soweto Students’ Representative Council (SSRC), Dan S. Montsitsi in connection with plans to commemorate the Soweto uprisings. Four white students are also arrested in the same connection.

13 November, The Anglican Bishop of Lesotho, the Rev. Desmond Tutu announces that he is giving up his current post to become Secretary-General of the South African Council of Churches (SACC) which is taking an increasingly radical position against apartheid.

Prices begin to rise sharply, making it even more difficult for workers to survive on low wages. Spontaneous strikes resulted: workers walk out of the work places demanding wage increases.
The Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act strips blacks of their South African Citizenship.
Fietas, Johannesburg: Lenasia is incorporated into the Johannesburg Municipal Area.
Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act (National States Citizenship Act) No 26:
Required all black persons to become citizens of a self-governing territorial authority. As Minister Connie Mulder stated: ‘No black person will eventually qualify in terms of section 10 because they will all be aliens, and as such, will only be able to occupy the houses bequeathed to them by their fathers, in the urban areas, by special permission of the Minister,’ i.e. black people are forced by residence in designated ‘homelands’ areas to be citizens of that homeland and denied South African nationality, the right to work in South Africa etc.
Assent gained: 26 March 1970; commencement date not found
Repealed by the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act No 200 of 1993.
Fatima Meer banned for planning mass rally with Steve Biko.
Winnie Mandela placed under house arrest.
Robert McBride's sister Gwynneth is born.
Coloured and Indian players are purged from African clubs.
South Africa is expelled from the Olympic Movement.
Thabo Mbeki is sent to Soviet Union for political training. Walter Sisulu and Abertina Sisulus son Max joins Thabo, and together they make their way to a remote military camp near a town called Sekhodia.
1 January, The Weights and Measures Bill providing for the metrification of weights and measures, thereby introducing the metric system, comes into effect.
9 January, The first week after the announcement of the agreement with the International Monetary Fund the price of gold falls below $35 per oz.
30 January, The Prime Minister announces that the government is watching the situation in Lesotho following the elections and that necessary measures have been taken to ensure the safety of South Africans there.
6 February, The Prime Minister announces that all Coloured people will be removed from the common voters’ roll.
11 February, A delegation from Mauritius arrives in Cape Town to discuss ways of strengthening links between Mauritius and South Africa.
16 February, Twenty-two Africans are acquitted of unlawful activities. Three are subsequently released, but the nineteen others are charged again under the Terrorism Act, and immediately taken into custody. They include Winnie Mandela.
18 February, Minister of Defence Botha, appeals in the House of Assembly to the British government to uphold its honour in respect of the Simonstown Agreement, otherwise South Africa will have to explore other avenues to strengthen its maritime forces.
23 February, The Bantu Laws Amendment Bill is passed.
26 February, The Bantu Homelands Citizenship Bill is passed, whereby every African is issued with a certificate of citizenship of his respective ‘homeland’.
6 March, The National Party manifesto reaffirms its belief in separate development programmes for the white, black, Coloured and Indian population.
10 March, South Africa’s consular representation will not be withdrawn from Rhodesia and South Africa’s relations with the Republic of Rhodesia will remain unchanged.
13 March, A total of 407 candidates are nominated for the 166 seats in the House of Assembly. Eight parties and five independents will contest 155 of the constituencies.
18 March, The Deputy Leader of the Herstigte Nasionale Party (HNP), Jaap Marais, is committed for trial in the Pretoria Supreme Court on three charges under the Official Secrets Act.
23 March, South Africa is banned from competing in the Davis Cup, as a result of South Africa’s apartheid stand in sport.
26 March, On this date all Africans become citizens of their ethnic ‘homelands’. However, they will not become foreigners in the Republic of South Africa.
South Africa signs treaty with Portugal (for Mozambique), amending Article XXXII of the Mozambique Convention.
April, The Leader of the United Party reiterates his party’s proposal for a Federal Constitution.
The Herstigte Nasionaie Party publishes its manifesto describing its aim of a society dominated by Christian national concepts and Afrikaans as the only official language.
2 April, South Africa signs agreement with Australia relating to air services.
13 April, B.J. Vorster states that he is prepared to meet demands that mixed sports should be allowed.
14 April, The United Nations Special Committee on Apartheid urges a boycott of all South African racist sporting organisations and supports an African proposal to exclude the Republic from both the Munich Olympics and the Olympic Movement itself.
22 April, The general election results in the return to power of the National Party for the sixth time since 1948, but with a reduced majority. There is an overall swing of two and a half percent to the United Party, and of five and a half percent away from the National Party with three percent going to the Herstigte Nasionale Party. The NP wins 117 seats with 820,968 votes cast. The UP wins forty-seven seats with 561,647 votes cast. The Progressive Party wins one seat with 51,760 votes cast.
24 April, It is confirmed in London that thirteen African countries have threatened to withdraw from the Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, if the South African cricket tour of Britain goes on.
27 April, The Prime Minister announces that his newly re-elected government is to continue its outward looking foreign policy as well as its policy of separate development.
11 May, The Prime Minister announces a Cabinet reshuffle.
13 May, South Africa signs multilateral treaty on certain dairy products.
15 May, The International Olympic Committee expels South Africa from the International Olympic Movement as a result of South Africans apartheid stand in sport.
18 May, Following the results obtained in the general election held in April, a new cabinet is sworn in.
19 May, John Vorster visits Malawi and stresses the desire for continued contact and co-operation between South Africa and Malawi, despite existing differences in outlook.
21 May, Private talks are held between John Vorster and Rhodesian Prime Minister lan Smith.
22 May, The English Cricket Council bows to British government pressure and calls off the all-white South African cricket tour.
29 May, Minister of Justice, P.C. Pelser, announces that the Attorney-General of the Transvaal is to prosecute thirty of the 357 people arrested in Johannesburg after an illegal march in protest against the continued detention of the twenty-two Africans held under the Terrorism Act.
3 June, The Prime Minister, accompanied by Dr. Muller, visits Portugal, and holds several meetings with the Portuguese Prime Minister and senior ministers. The friendly talks cover a wide field and include the Cahora Bassa scheme.
9 June, The Prime Minister visits Spain and holds discussions with senior officials. A meeting is held with General Franco.
10 June, John Vorster hold talks in Paris with the French Prime minister covering French investments in South Africa.
12 June, The seventh ‘homeland’ is inaugurated with the installation of Chief Gatsha Buthelezi as Chief Executive Officer of the Zululand Territorial Authority (ZTA).
13 June, P.W. Botha announces that South Africa is establishing a new submarine base at Simonstown at a cost of $7.7m.
14 June, Prime Minister Vorster and Dr. Muller arrive in Geneva. A meeting is held with twelve South African ambassadors to European countries, and with the head of the South African mission to the United Nations in Geneva, concerned with means of improving South Africa’s image in Europe.
24 June, Exchange of notes with Portugal on the issue of copyright in maps.
July, The first General Students' Council of South African Students' Organisation (SASO) is convened, where the organisation takes a bolder stance. The organisation encourages contact between SASO and other multi-racial organisations such as the United Christian Movement (UCM) and the Institute of Race Relations, but recognition of National Union of South African Students (NUSAS) as a “true” national union of students is withdrawn. SASO becomes identified with a well-articulated ideology of Black Consciousness.
1 July, The question of the resumption of arms supplies by Britain to South Africa is discussed by the Foreign Minister, Dr. H. Muller and the new British Foreign Secretary, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, in London, in the context of the Simonstown Agreement.
6 July, The British Conservative government’s intention to resume arms supplies is announced in the House of Commons. Other Commonwealth governments are formally informed of this intention on 10-11 July 1970. Hostile reactions follow.
10 July,  Other Commonwealth governments are formally informed of the British Conservative government’s intention to resume arms supplies
11 July, The United States Secretary of State reiterates America’s adherence to the policy of not supplying arms and military equipment to South Africa.
20 July, The Prime Minister announces in the House of Assembly that South African scientists have succeeded in developing a new process for uranium enrichment, and are building a pilot plant for this process.
The British Foreign Secretary, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, makes a statement in the House of Commons on the question of arms for South Africa. Emphasizing the vital importance of the sea routes around South Africa.
23 July, The United Nations Security Council condemns all violations of its embargo against South Africa. After five meetings on this question Resolution 281 (1970) is subsequently passed calling on all states to strengthen the arms embargo. It is adopted by twelve votes to none against, France, Great Britain and the United States abstaining.
The Minister of Defence tells Parliament that South Africa in fact spends less than 3 percent of her national income on defence.
Security Council adopted resolution 282 (1970) calling on States to take a series of measures to strengthen the arms embargo against South Africa. The vote was 12 in favour and 3 abstentions (France, UK, USA).
27 July, An Uranium Enrichment Bill is announced, establishing the Uranium Enrichment Corporation of South Africa.
29 July, The International Court of Justice in the Hague unanimously condemns the continuing presence of South Africa in Namibia and defines the legal consequences.
August, In an article published in the South African Students Organisation (SASO) newsletter Steve Biko writes: “The integration they (liberals) talk about...is artificial...one-way of course, with the Whites doing all the talking and the Blacks the listening“
3 August, South Africa signs amendments with Portugal (for Mozambique) an the Mozambique Convention.
15 August, Several pamphlet bombs, scattering ANC pamphlets, explode in a number of cities.
19 August, The Chinese community is granted official white’ status for the first time. but only for sport and leisure. Subsequently the leader of the HNP, Dr. Hertzog, accuses the government of betraying South Africa’s traditional principles of racial segregation.
24 August, A second trial of the nineteen Africans, acquitted in February begins after they have been in detention for seventeen months. They are all acquitted and released on 14 September 1970 only to be served subsequently with orders by the Minister of Justice placing them under restriction.
September, South Africa signs visa agreement with Spain.
Speaking in the House of Assembly, Prime Minister Vorster said that South Africa was prepared to enter into a non-aggression pact with neighbouring States.
28 September, The Minister of Justice announces in the House of Assembly that as of 1 January 1970 there were 809 persons serving prison sentences imposed under security laws.
The provincial elections continue to demonstrate the slight swing away from the National Party, with the United Party making a net gain of six seats. The result: National Party 118 seats, the United Party fifty-nine seats, others nil.
30 September, B.S. Ramotse is sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment by Justice G. Viljoen in the Pretoria Supreme Court. He is found guilty of taking part in terrorist activities and plotting the violent overthrow of the state.
5 October, South Africa signs multilateral Convention on the Conflict of Laws Relating to the Form of Testamentary Dispositions.
24 October, In a Declaration on the 25th anniversary of the United Nations, the General Assembly described apartheid as “a crime against the conscience and dignity of mankind“. (Resolution 2627 (XXV))
4 November, President Houphouet-Boigny of the Ivory Coast announces he is planning an African Summit Conference to urge a dialogue with South Africa. This initiative meets with very various reactions throughout the continent, but is welcomed in South Africa.
9 November, South Africa signs agreement with Netherlands modifying existing agreement on air services
13 November - 1 December, The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Michael Ramsey, visits South Africa on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Anglican Church in South Africa. He repeatedly expresses his views on political and social problems arising from the government’s apartheid policy.
13 November, After a challenge of the credentials of the South African delegation by many Member States, the General Assembly approved the report of the Credentials Committee “except with regard to the credentials of the representatives of the Government of South Africa“. [(Resolution 2636 (XXV))]
15 November, At the twenty-fourth General Assembly of the United Nations, South Africa joined all the leading maritime powers in opposing a section of the Resolutions on Peaceful Uses of the Sea-Bed.
19 November, John Vorster appoints Theo Gerdener as Minister of the Interior in succession to Marais Viljoen. The latter retains the Labour portfolio and takes over Posts and Telegraphs in addition. The South African Broadcasting Corporation will come under the direct control of the Ministry of National Education.
20 November, The South African Foreign Minister signs an economic agreement with the Malagasy Republic, which provides for a financial loan from South Africa to help the Malagasy tourist industry.
21 November, Six prominent members of the HNP resign, having lost all confidence in the leadership of the party. Resignations include that of Dr. Willie Lubbe, editor of the party’s newspaper ‘Die Afrikaner’.
5 December, The government’s policy for the coloured people is restated by a Cabinet Minister. Any policy, or lack thereof, which can lead to integration on whatever basis between whites and coloureds is rejected; the idea of a specific homeland for the coloured people is impracticable; extended and consistent liaison between the coloureds and the white authorities is promised. The government remains firmly committed to the principle of parallel development.
11 December, South Africa signs a customs agreement with Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland.
16 December, South Africa signs multilateral treaty on the suppression of unlawful seizure of aircraft.
24 December, The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development leaves Malawi after a four-day visit during which cooperation between nations of Southern Africa is endorsed.
1971
The Natal Indian Congress is revived.
The Voice of Women magazine is launched.
Despite the formative influence of a highly politicised father, one of Robert McBride's first personal experiences of racism is at Zoo Lake, Johannesburg. He joins some White children playing with a fish in a bucket, recently caught by a White youth of about 18 who, kicks Robert (of mixed race) in the crotch. This becomes an incident that his younger sister uses to taunt him.
South African Students' Organisation (SASO) helps launch the Black Community Programme.
Strini Moodley and Saths Cooper, members of the Natal Indian Congress (NIC) urge other Indian activists to embrace the Black Consciousness ideology. Although there is sympathy among NIC members, they view South African Students Organisations ideas of Black consciousness as potentially leading to Black racism.
The National Professional Soccer League (NPSL) launches the Keg League (later renamed Castle League), sponsored by South African Breweries.
Kaizer Motaungs All-Star XI is renamed Kaizer Chiefs.
Thabo Mbeki is transferred to Lusaka, Zambia.
14 January - 21 January, A conference of Heads of Government from the Commonwealth is held in Singapore at which Britain’s proposed sale of arms to South Africa is extensively debated. A study group is set up to consider the question in the context of the security of maritime trade routes in the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
20 January, The Anglican Dean of Johannesburg, the Very Rev. Gonville Aubie ffrench-Beytagh, is detained by the police, accused of subversive activities.
1 February, South Africa signs an amendment with Malawi on the provisions of the trade agreement of 13 March 1967.
2 February, South Africa signs the Convention of Wetlands and Water Fowl.
The Minister of Justice says, in Parliament, that for as long as the present government is in power the Immorality Act will not be repealed.
8 February, The text of a letter from South Africa to the International Court of Justice at The Hague, officially requesting it to cooperate in supervising a plebiscite in Namibia, is released. The Court is considering a request by the United Nations Security Council for an opinion on the legal consequences of South Africa’s continued presence in the territory in defiance of United Nations resolutions.
Minister of Labour Marais Viljoen announces total exemption for Coloureds from job reservation in the building industry on the Reef and in Pretoria.
11 February, South Africa signs treaty with Israel on the reciprocal recognition of air worthiness certificates between South Africa and Israel.
South Africa signs multilateral treaty pertaining to nuclear weapons on the seabed.
16 February, A number of religious ministers and lay workers from Europe and America are told to leave the country.
19 February, It is reported that the Security Police have detained about twenty Africans, Coloureds and Asians. The detainees are said to be members of the Unity Movement of South Africa, founded in 1943 by Coloured schoolteachers.
The South African arms question is discussed in a closed session of the Singapore Commonwealth Conference.
20 February, The British Prime Minister reiterates his government’s attitude to the sale of arms in South Africa, at the Commonwealth Conference in Singapore. Accordingly the South African government has assured Britain that it had no aggressive intentions and that maritime arms would be used only to secure the sea routes.
22 February, The South African Defence Ministry announces that the British government, following its obligations as per the Simonstown Agreement, is willing to give an export licence for Wasp helicopters as requested by South Africa.
25 February, The Chief of the Security Police announces that raids undertaken on this date at offices of Christian and student organisations in the country’s main cities have revealed quantities of documents concerning ffrench-Beytagh’s activities. The Dean is consequently remanded until 28 May 1971 and again until 30 June 1971. The original charges are withdrawn: a new indictment is drawn up under the Terrorism Act.
The OAU publishes a statement condemning Britain’s proposed sale of helicopters to South Africa.
March, The Bantu Homelands Constitution Bill is enacted in the last week of March. 3 Mar. 1971 A Constitution Amendment Bill, empowering the government to proclaim any African language an official language in any self-governing territory, when considered fit passes its second reading at a joint sitting of both Houses of Parliament. Seven different African languages will thus be given official recognition.
11 March, A resolution is passed at a student body meeting for the establishment of a student Wages Commission. David Hemson, Halton Cheadle, David Davis, Karel Tip and Charles Nupen together with political scientist Rick Turner lead the collective thinking on the establishment of the Commission.
15 March, South Africa signs treaty with Netherlands for the avoidance of double taxation and the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income.
19 March, Prime Minister Vorster says that his government is prepared to engage in dialogue, without preconditions, with other African countries prepared to talk. His offer meets with mixed reactions throughout the continent.
22 March, A statement by Ghana’s Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Ghanal. National Assembly indicates a readiness to visit South Africa.
26 March, The Prime Minister of Swaziland visits Cape Town for talks with John Vorster and confirms that a policy of friendship and cooperation towards the Republic is being maintained.
29 March, South Africa signs Wheat Trade Convention.
30 March, Prime Minister Vorster holds his first-ever international press conference and asserts that discussion of separate development with Africa’s black leaders will be welcomed. A policy of external dialogue is to be pursued.
Referring to allegations that a vendetta is being conducted against churches and religious workers in South Africa. Prime Minister Vorster says that of 1,440 religious workers only six have been deported in the last ten years, seventeen were refused extensions of permits and two were refused visas.
End-March:The Bantu Homelands Constitution Bill is enacted. It empowers the government to grant self-government, on an equal footing with that of the Transkei, to any area with a Territorial Authority, upon the latter’s request, at any time, by simple proclamation, after consultation with the Territorial Authority concerned, but without parliamentary enactment.
31 March, Bantu Homelands Constitution Act (National States Constitutional Act) No 21:
Provided for the granting of increased powers to homeland governments, thus facilitating their eventual ‘independence’.
Repealed by Section 7 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act No 200 of 1993.
1 April, Accepts the accession of Ireland to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
13 April, The Chief Minister of Transkei demands full control of all departments of state.
16 April, The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, MC. Botha, replies to Paramount Chief Kaiser Matanzima’s demands for increased control and for the transference to the Transkei of certain lands technically within its boundaries, from the Republic. Certain police stations will be transferred to Transkeian jurisdiction.
21 April, The Prime Minister refers to the Chief Minister of Transkei’s demands of 13 April and points out that Defence could not be transferred as it would mean changing the Constitution of the Transkei Act of 1963.
Prime Minister Vorster makes a lengthy statement on South Africa’s relations with Zambia.
22 April, The Ciskei Territorial Authority elects a twenty-member select committee to draft a Constitution for an independent Ciskei.
Speaking in the House of Assembly the Prime Minister lays down guidelines for international sports meetings in South Africa. He makes it clear, however, that there has been no change in sports policy on the club, provincial and national levels.
23 April, Prime Minister Vorster denies that he has broken any confidence in disclosing exchanges with Zambia and he added that it was fallacious that he indicated that he was willing to discuss Rhodesia’s future with President Kaunda.
28 April, The President of the Ivory Coast reiterates his initiative for opening a dialogue with South Africa. While Swaziland approves the dialogue, Tanzania and Mauritius refuse to participate and many member states of the OAU strongly oppose it.
1 May, The Tswana Legislative Assembly comes into being.
3 May, Chief Kaiser Matanzima denies in the Transkei Legislative Assembly that he is agitating for independence at this state, but he will continue to make certain legitimate land claims.
South Africa signs treaty with Malawi on the avoidance of double taxation and the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income.
5 May, A wide-ranging bill providing severe penalties for dealing in or using dangerous drugs is published.
6 May, Minister of Defence P.W. Botha announces in the House of Assembly that South Africa has reached such a degree of self-sufficiency that it does not need any arms from the outside world for internal security.
12 May, Extension of University Education Amendment Act No 29:
In order to prevent students from changing courses after admission, the Minister would give consent only in respect of a specific university and a specified qualification. He could withdraw his consent if the student concerned changed her/his course of study
Repealed by 21 of the Tertiary Education Act No 66 of 1988.
14 May, The International Court of Justice at The Hague rejects the government’s application that a plebiscite be organized in Namibia and rejects the offer of additional documentation about the situation there.
16 May, Prime Minister Vorster declares that if the positive signs of cooperation with the rest of Africa are interpreted correctly, South Africa could become the leading state of Southern Africa.
21 May, South Africa Joins the International Telecommunications Satellite Organisation (lntelsat).
26 May, South Africa Signs multilateral articles of agreement on the Southern African Regional Tourism Council.
1 June, The Venda and Ciskei territorial authorities are replaced by legislative assemblies.
8 June, The first meeting of the student Wages Commission is held at the Bolton hall at the University of Natal, Durban (UND). Beforehand, thousands of pamphlets announcing the meeting and explaining the Poverty Datum Line (PDL) were printed and distributed by the students to workers in industrial areas, outside factory gates and at taxi ranks. 400 workers attend, and all sign an objection to the Wage Boards latest ruling on the minimum wage, and demand a minimum wage of R20 per week. The petition is ignored by the government Wages Board which sets down a minimum of R 8,50.
9 June, The Minister of Coloured Affairs pledges himself to strive for equal pay for equal work for Coloureds.
An unintended consequence of the first meeting of the Wages Commission is seen the following day, when a group of workers at the McWillaw Iron and Steel Foundry in Isipingo stop work. Waving the Wages Commission pamphlets, the workers quote R 16,50 as a minimum weekly income. The police were called in and an agreement with management is reached, with no pay increase.
11 June, Minister of the Interior Theo Gerdener, indicates that the Public Service Commission will make a comprehensive study to create a more satisfactory ratio between white and non-white salaries in government service.
14 June, The World Council of Churches cancels a special consultation in South Africa because of unacceptable conditions imposed on it by Prime Minister Vorster.
15 June, South Africa Signs amendment of Article 50(A) of the Convention on International Civil Aviation.
20 June, At the meetings of Council of Ministers of the OAU, dialogue with South Africa is firmly rejected.
21 June, The International Court of Justice at The Hague declares that South Africa is under obligation to withdraw its administration from Namibia immediately and thus put an end to its occupation of the territory. John Vorster reacts by indicating that as the judgment is only advisory, it can not be considered binding, and South Africa will act as it sees fit.
22 June, A Pretoria court rules that the former leader of the banned PAC, Robert Sobukwe, will not be allowed to use his exit permit (granted by the Minister of the Interior) to leave South Africa permanently because the Minister of Justice refuses to lift his banning order confining him to the magisterial district of Kimberley.
25 June, At the first Wages Board meeting where students make a presentation, students lead evidence on the cement products industry. In the weeks before the meeting, students produce and distribute pamphlets outside factories, which explain the procedures of the Wage Board and the kind of evidence that will make a presentation effective. Workers are encouraged to draw up an inventory of their expenses to show that their current minimum wage is too low. More importantly workers are encouraged to attend the Boards meeting.
27 June, The Chairman of Armscor announces that under an agreement with a French aviation company, Mirage III and F jet fighters will be built in South Africa with the help of French personnel.
28 June, Father Cosmos Desmond, British born Roman Catholic priest, is placed under house arrest in Johannesburg by an order signed by the Minister of Justice.
30 June, Membership of the Bank for International Settlement is extended to the South African Reserve Bank.
July, The South African Communist Party paper, Inkululeko-Freedom is launched: a sign of underground activities inside the country.
Adoption of the South African Students' Organisation (SASO) policy manifesto, stating the centrality of the Black Consciousness doctrine.
July, A proposal is made at a National Union of South African Students (NUSAS) conference that wages and economic commissions, based on the UND model, be set up at Witwatersrand University (Wits), the University of Cape Town (UCT), Rhodes University (Rhodes) and the University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg (UNP). The proposal calls for a national effort to investigate the operation of the Wage Board, for students to present research to Board meetings and assist workers in presenting their demands. Whilst the motion is passed, the challenge to coordinate activities remains.
5 July, The Minister of Information outlines his government’s plan for the nine homelands’ of South Africa in London. They are to become sovereign states in their own right, independent, entitled to maintain their own languages cultures and identities in their own way, according to their own wishes in their own geographical territories.
17 July, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on the partial revision of the 1959 radio regulations.
25 July, Joe Kachingwe is appointed Malawi’s first Ambassador to South Africa and assumes office in Pretoria on 29 July 1971.
27 July, Prime Minister Vorster completes a tour of African homelands’ in the Northern Transvaal during which he holds talks with leaders of the North Sotho, Tswana and Venda homelands. The importance of working together is emphasized. Regular consultation is promised.
29 July, The International Court of Justice in The Hague unanimously condemns the continuing presence of South Africa in South West Africa and defines the legal consequences.
2 August, The trial of the Very Rev. Gonville Aubie ffrench-Beytagh begins in the Pretoria Supreme Court. Sidney Kentridge appears as Council for the Defence. The Dean himself explains his attitudes and beliefs in evidence given by him on 14-20 September 1971.
4 August, The government gives limited powers of internal self-government to homeland’, Damaraland, in Namibia.
5 August, The Minister of Defence says that South Africa has become so self-sufficient in the manufacture of arms that she is considering exporting weapons. European countries have accepted that military equipment of a high quality is being produced.
7 August, A Malagasy government delegation arrives for a five-day visit aimed at consolidating relations between the two countries. It is agreed to establish a permanent joint commission to explore further fields of co-operation.
10 August, Eleven bombs explode, scattering ANC propaganda leaflets in the four major cities. The blasts occur twelve months after similar actions in the same cities.
16 August - 20 August, President Hastings Banda, President of Malawi, pays a state visit to South Africa, meeting the State President and the Prime Minister. On his return, he declares that 99% of the Africans whom he met supported his policy of contact with Pretoria.
25 August, The leader of the Zulu Territorial Authority, Chief Buthelezi, calls for a National Convention of all races in South Africa to decide the country’s future political direction. John Vorster rejects this completely, but it is supported as a constructive proposal by both the opposition United Party and the Progressive Party.
30 August, The government announces programmes for expanded development and augmented political powers for the Ovambo and Kavango homelands in Namibia.
September, 2000 stevedores threaten to strike if their wages are not raised. David Hemson, a student conducting research on the stevedores, begins to play a more active role as an advocate for the stevedores. Their demand is for a R14 wage increase, still below the PDL. The Wages Commission is instrumental in getting the attention of the White press, especially in terms of wages being below the poverty datum line.
11 September, The Australian Cricket Board decides to withdraw its invitation to the South African Cricket Team to tour Australia. Minister of Sport F.W. Waring blames acts of anarchy and threats of a misguided minority for this decision.
15 September, At the twenty-fifth session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, 
18 September, During a meeting with representatives of the nine member churches of the World Council of Churches in South Africa, Prime Minister Vorster reaffirms that he will not consider allowing a WCC delegation to come to South Africa under any conditions. Nor will he allow any funds to be sent from South Africa to the World Council.
23 September, Signs multilateral treaty for the suppression of unlawful acts against the safety of civil aviation.
26 September, Minister of Coloured Affairs, J.J. Loots announces that larger Coloured group areas will gradually be transformed into fully fledged municipalities, under the Coloured Persons Representative Council.
28 September, President Idi Amin of Uganda offers to dispatch a ten-man investigatory mission to South Africa. South Africa replies by inviting Amin himself, or one or more members of his government instead - an alternative which proves unacceptable.
Signs Customs Convention on the Temporary Importation of Professional and
30 September, It is officially announced that the British and South African naval units will engage in a month of joint manoeuvres in South African waters from 4 October to 3 November 1971.
South Africa Signs amendment to the trade agreement of 20 August 1932 with Great Britain.
October, The new leader of the Progressive Party, Cohn Eglin, together with Helen Suzman, undertake a visit to seven black African states.
4 October, Chief Leabua Jonathan, Prime Minister of Lesotho, warns that violent confrontation between blacks and whites will be an inevitable consequence of apartheid. Mr Vorster responds with restraint, in the interest of friendship.
Three leaders of ‘homelands’ governments - Paramount Chief Kaiser Matanzima (Transkei), Chief Gatsha Buthelezi (Zulu Territorial Authority) and Chief Lucas Mangope (Councillor of the Tswanas) - visit Great Britain at the invitation of the British government to study British institutions and the independence processes undergone by the former High Commission Territories.
5 October, The Prime Minister announces at the National Party Congress the incidences on the border of Zambia and the Caprivi Strip. He reminds the Congress of his previous warnings that South Africa will not tolerate the incursion of communist trained terrorists into South African territory and they will be pursued to the land from where they came.
6 October, The Minister of State of the Ivory Coast, Koffia Ndia, visits South Africa, reraffirming the country’s commitment to dialogue.
7 October, SWAPO claims it was not responsible for placing landmines in the Caprivi Strip and that the guerrillas were not operating from Zambia, but from inside Namibia.
8 October, The United Nations Security Council meets in emergency session to hear a complaint by Zambia against numerous violations by South African forces against the sovereignty, airspace and territorial integrity of Zambia. South Africa categorically rejects the Zambian allegations.
11 October, South Africa Signs visa agreement with Iran.
12 October, The Security Council unanimously adopts an amended resolution, sponsored by four African states, which declares that army violation of the border of a member-state is contrary to the UN Charter. It calls on South Africa to respect Zambia’s sovereignty.
South Africa Signs amendments to the multilateral treaty on the safety of life at sea.
13 October, South Africa Signs treaty with Australia on postal parcels.
15 October, Accepts the accession of Romania to the General Agreement on Tarnfs and Trade.
18 October, The seventh Summit Conference of the Fast and Central African states, held in Mogadishu, adopts a Declaration urging armed struggle to liberate Southern Africa, to which they grant total support. This rejection of South Africa’s dialogue policy is welcomed by the leaders of both the ANC, Alfred Nzo and the PAC.
23 October, An article appearing in the Daily News argues: for those who lightly dismiss the students as immature cranks, the Commissions activities provide food for thought. They should not have to fight this battle alone.
24 October, The Security Police raid more than 100 homes throughout the country in a search for illegal political literature.
28 October, It is officially confirmed that one of nineteen Indians detained, Ahmed Timol, a Moslem teacher, has jumped to his death from the tenth floor of the main police building in Johannesburg - the seventeenth death in detention under security laws. Following calls from the opposition and others for a judicial inquiry into deaths of police detainees, the Prime Minister states on the following day, 29 October 1971, that he finds no need for this.
Winnie Mandela is given a six-month suspended sentence for defying a banning order. She is to appear in court on 16 November 1971 on a second similar charge.
29 October, The Prime Minister emphasizes that following the church’s subversive activities, that a comprehensive and serious investigation in connection with terrorism and sabotage can be expected.
November, End- Novemember:Chiefs Buthelezi and Mangope visit West Germany in early November and hold discussions with ministers and officials.
November, 2000 Ovambo contract labourers in Windhoek strike for higher wages. There is increased interest by the public and government on the question of Black wages.
1 November, After a protracted trial the Anglican Dean of Johannesburg, the Very Rev. Gonville Aubie ffrench-Beytagh is found guilty on ten points of subversive activities against the state and is sentenced to five years’ imprisonment with a grant of leave to appeal. The sentence is followed by wide-spread criticism and protests, both within and without the country.
3 November, Please ensure that the event is listed in such a way that is answers the questions WHO? WHAT? WHThe Cape Provincial Council approves the Local Authorities Voters’ Amendment Ordinance, removing the names of Coloured persons from the common voters rolls of municipal and divisional councils in the Cape Province, depriving them of tights enjoyed for over 100 years.ERE and if interpretation is included WHY? (eg. South Africans vote in the first democratic elections in South Africa).
12 November, The biennial Congress of the United Party requests the government to hold a referendum before sovereign independence is granted to ‘homelands’. The party remains opposed to the separate development policy.
Signs amendments to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
Accepts the accession of the Congo to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
13 November, The World Council of Churches meeting in Geneva states that the sentence against Rev. ffrench-Beytagh will stir up the world’s indignation against South Africa.
16 November, Signs amendments to the Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961.
24 November, Signs agreement with Portugal (for Mozambique) pertaining to rivers of mutual interest.
26 November, Black Affairs Administration Act No 45:
Provided for black self-government in townships.
Repealed by 69 of the Black Communities Development Act No 4 of 1984.
29 November, The United Nations General Assembly asks all world governments to apply a full-scale embargo on arms supplies to South Africa, condemns the establishment of Bantustans and asks national and international sports organisations to refuse any recognition to any sporting activity involving racial, religious or political discrimination.
The General Assembly adopted resolution 2775 D (XXVI) calling for a boycott of sports teams selected in violation of the Olympic principle of non-discrimination. It also condemned the establishment of bantustans and forced removals of African people.
December, The Durban Wages Commission begins printing Isisebenzi (The Workers), a newspaper for workers. They also publish the Bulletin of the Wages Commission which reports on strikes, the work of the Commission, and labour disputes.
At this time however, the morale of some students begins to wane. David Hemson becomes despondent about the lack of progress on the work of the Commission and considers withdrawing.
2 December, Robert Sobukwe, former PAC leader, is finally refused permission to leave the country, the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court dismisses his appeal against a lower court decision.
4 December, The Defence Minister denies that South Africa has sent troops to Malawi to quell the security threat on Malawi’s southern border, but military equipment is being supplied.
Speaking at the installation of Prince Goodwill Zwelithini as Paramount Chief of the Zulu nation in Nongoma, the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development supports the traditional system of Chieftainship. His speech is resented by the Chief Executive Officer of the Zulu Territorial Authority, Chief Gatsha Buthelezi, who construes it as directed against himself.
13 December, South Africa Signs treaty with Australia concerning an international observer scheme for landbased whaling stations.
17 December, Conclusion of the UN General Assembly six resolutions denounce the South African government’s apartheid policy.
1972
The Black People’s Convention is formed to co-ordinate the Black Consciousness movement.
Bophuthatswana, Ciskei and Lebowa are granted self-government status.
Military conscription for white youths is extended to one year.
Three important Black Consciousness Organisations are established:
1)The Black People's Convention (BPC)
2)Black Community Project (BPC)
3)South African Students' Movement (SASM)
The Chatsworth train boycott, a public stance on foreign investment attracts more attention to the Black People's Convention (BPC) The Black Allied Workers' Union is also launched.
Between 1972 and 1977, all the homelands were given self-government similar to that of the Transkei (Dugard 1978: 91). All enactments of the Legislative Assemblies of the homelands required the approval of the State President of the Republic of South Africa.
Bophuthatswana, Ciskei and Lebowa proclaimed a self-governing territories.
Marriage Act No 4:
Created a local marriage recognition regime, distinct from that of South Africa.
Lillian Ngoyi’s banning order lapses.
Bernard Dancing Shoes Hartze (Cape Town Spurs, Federation Professional league) sets a South African record for a single season goal-scoring average: 35 goals in 16 matches.
January, The campus wages survey at UND had yet to be completed. The problem is with the questionnaires, which though completed, have to be redone. It is decided that Black fieldworkers conduct interviews and that money should be budgeted for this purpose.
At this time Mike Murphy of the UNP is asked to take over the Wages Commission.
Also at this time several studies are published on the "minimum needs" debate. The South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) as well as the University of Port Elizabeth published findings on the PDL as well as the Minimum Effective Level (MEL).
12 January, The Paramount Chief of the Zulus, Prince Goodwill Zwelethini, is officially removed as a member of the Zulu Legislative Assembly by an amendment to the Constitution. His position henceforth will be similar to that of the State President.
27 January, Signs Convention on Psychotropic Substances.
28 January, The Ministry of Foreign Affairs says that South Africa will not attend the African session of the United Nations Security Council in Addis Ababa. It is not a member and the circumstances are not exceptional enough to request permission to do so.
2 February, An abridged version of the security report by Justice H.J. Potgieter’s Commission of Inquiry on State Security is submitted to the House of Assembly. The report finds that South Africa’s security is being threatened by numerous enemies in almost every sphere of society.
4 February, At the United Nations Security Council’s Special Session on Colonialism and Racial Injustice in Southern Africa in Addis Ababa, a resolution is adopted condemning the government for its racial policies and calling for strict adherence by all states to the arms embargo.
The Prime Minister states in the House of Assembly in Cape Town that the United Nations General-Secretary, Dr. Waldheim, will be welcome and the government is willing to discuss with him, inter alia, black self-determination.
The Security Council, meeting in Addis Ababa, adopted resolution 311 (1972) condemning apartheid; recognising the legitimacy of the struggle of the oppressed people of South Africa; calling upon South Africa to release all those imprisoned as a result of apartheid; calling upon all States to observe strictly the arms embargo against South Africa; urging governments and individuals to contribute to UN funds to assist victims of apartheid; and commending organisations and individuals assisting in the education and training of South Africans. The vote was 14 in favour and one abstention (France).
10 February, The United Nations Secretary-General, Dr. Waldheim, announces in New York that he has received a formal invitation to visit South Africa for discussions without pre-conditions.
11 February, The House of Assembly approves, by eighty-six votes to forty-three, a motion to appoint a Select Committee to inquire into and report upon the objects, organisation, activities, financing and related matters of the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS), the South African Institute of Race Relations, the University Christian Movement (UCM), the Christian Institute of Southern Africa and their subordinate organisations.
15 February, The Department of Bantu Development is planning for the consolidation of the ‘homelands’ by buying land in terms of the 1936 legislation.
21 February, The Chairman of the South African Coloured Peoples Representative Council reports that the Prime Minister favours Coloureds gradually taking over all posts in the administration of coloured affairs.
25 February, Signs extradition agreement with Malawi.
29 February, Certificates of citizenship in the ‘homelands’ are to be issued by seven homeland authorities in their respective capitals in terms of the Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act of 1970.
March, The United Nations Secretary-General, Dr. Kurt Waldheim, initiates discussions on the future of Namibia during a five-day visit to South Africa.
March, Under the leadership of Murphy, the survey is completed. It finds that of the 59 unskilled African employees of the university, more than 70% earn wages below the PDL. Both the Durban and Pietermaritzburg Commissions recommend that the PDL be incorporated as the minimum wage level by January 1973. University authorities agreed to the recommendations only after students threaten to go to the press with their findings.
4 March, Dr. Basil Moore, Johannesburg Methodist Minister, staff member of the Christian Institute and acting Secretary of the University Christian Movement, is restricted for five years under the Suppression of Communism Act,
The largest single construction work undertaken in South Africa, the Hendrik Verwoerd Dam on the Orange River, is officially opened by State President Fouché.
The United Party scores significant victories in municipal elections in Johannesburg and Randburg, continuing a noticeable swing against the National Party.
6 March, The Democratic Party, formed by a splinter group from the National Party, indicates that it represents a coalition of the policies of the National, United and Progressive parties, and outlines its proposed reforms. These include granting the African population representation on municipal councils on the same basis as the white population.
8 March, Suppression of Communism Amendment Act No 2:
Amended provisions regarding the participation of certain persons in the activities of certain organisations as well as ministerial powers regarding the registration of newspapers.
Repealed by 73 of the Internal Security Act No 74 of 1982.
16 March, The Head of the Security Police, General Venter, reports that nobody is still being held incommunicado under the Terrorism Act, and that all those people detained by the Security Police have now been released. However investigations continue.
17 March - 24 March, President Fouché pays a state visit to Malawi and appeals for peaceful co-existence and cooperation between African states. An extradition agreement between the two countries is published in Pretoria on 24 March 1972.
29 March, South Africa Signs treaty with Brazil on the issue of avoiding double taxation on profits derived from shipping and aviation.
April, A Legislative Assembly for Vendaland opens for the first time.
April - June, Serious student unrest occurs at both black and white English-language universities leading to forceful police action against demonstrators in Cape Town, Johannesburg and elsewhere. Of the total 618 persons arrested in connection with student protests all those tried in court, for various alleged offences, are acquitted - except one student fined R50 for addressing a meeting.
April, UCT students at the Wage Board sitting for the Mineral waters manufacturing industry point out that the government policy as stated in parliament earlier that year, is to reduce the historical wage gap between White and Black. Arguing that the gap had actually widened, the students question the role of the Board in preventing the position of Black workers from deteriorating further.
1 April, The names of the four ‘homelands’ are changed: from Basotho ha Borwa (Southern Sotho) to Basotho-Qwaqwa; from Tswanaland to Bophuthatswana; from Machangana to Gazankulu; from Zululand to Kwazulu.
Under its new constitution Kwazulu Territorial Authority becomes Kwazulu Legislative Assembly. Its members undertake to honour and respect the State President and the Paramount Chief, but do not swear allegiance to the South African government and the Zulu royal family is denied executive powers.
5 April, South Africa Signs additional articles relevant to the constitution of the Universal Postal Union.
6 April, In the Natal Supreme Court in Pietermaritzburg, at the end of the longest trial of its kind in South Africa, thirteen defendants (nine Africans, two Indians and two Coloureds) are sentenced to imprisonment from five to eight years for contravening the Terrorism Act. They are found guilty of conspiring to overthrow the government by force.
10 April, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on the prohibition of the development, production and stockpiling of bacteriological and toxic weapons and their destruction.
14 April, The appeal by the Anglican Dean, the Very Rev. Gonville Aubie ffrench-Beytagh, against his conviction and sentence under the Terrorism Act is upheld in the Appellate Division of the South African Supreme Court in Bloemfontein. The Dean thereupon leaves South Africa for Britain on the same day.
19 April, The National Party increases its majority in the Oudtshoorn by-election. In the campaign heavy emphasis is placed on the dangers of the United Party race policies.
3 May, Onkgopotse Abram Tiro is expelled from University of the North (Turfloop), student protests follow his expulsion. 
The Transkei Legislative Assembly requests independence for the Transkei, subject to the inclusion of additional white areas.
12 May, The South African Students Organisation (SASO) adopts the Alice Declaration at the federal Theological Seminary in the Eastern Cape. The Declaration resolves that students nationwide should close down Black institutions of higher education through lecture boycotts in support of the expelled, Onkgopotse Abram Tiro, from the University of the North (Turfloop)
24 May, The Security Intelligence and State Security Council Bill is adopted defining the functions and duties of the Bureau of State Security (BOSS), and setting up a State Security Council, with the Prime Minister as Chairman, to advise government on national policy and strategy on security. It has the support of both opposition parties.
The first hijacking of a South African Airways plane takes place on a flight to Malawi. The two men responsible are subsequently apprehended and tried.
June, A sixteen day inquest at the Regional Court in Johannesburg concludes that A.E. Timol, a political detainee who fell to his death from the tenth floor of a building while in police custody, committed suicide, and nobody is held accountable.
June, At a meeting of textile and furniture workers in Bolton Hall, Hemson tables the idea of starting a union, but this is not pursued. Harriet Bolton puts forward the idea of a fund to collect subscriptions from workers and to administer funeral benefits, which is enthusiastically accepted by the meeting. The General Factory Workers Benefit Fund (GFWBF) is launched in Durban and the first members sign up in October at the Benefit Funds Pietermaritzburg office.
1 June, Bophuthatswana is granted self government
South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on the conservation of Antarctic seals.
The planned reopening of the University of the North (Turfloop) fails. Every major Black campus endorses strike action. Their grievances go beyond the Turfloop expulsions to reiterate long-standing student complaints about domination by White staff, biased curricula and demeaning campus conditions.
2 June, Student protest erupts into violence outside St. George’s Cathedral in Cape Town. Force is used to dispel demonstrators.
Admission of Persons to the Republic Regulation Act No 59:
Consolidated the laws relating to prohibited persons and to the admission of persons to the Republic or any of its provinces.
Repealed by 60 of the Abolition of Racially Based Land Measures Act No 108 of 1991.
6 June, A proclamation is issued tinder the Riotous Assemblies Act banning political gatherings, processions, and protests for five weeks in the Cape, Johannesburg, Pretoria, and thirteen other places.
7 June, The Chief Executive Councillor of Kwazulu, Chief Buthelezi, condemns plans to consolidate Zululand in terms of the 1936 Trust and Land Act.
12 June, The Post Office Amendment Bill provides for the interception of mall and telephone and other communications where necessary in the interests of state security. Only the Progressive Party member, Helen Suzman, votes against it.
14 June, Security Intelligence and State Security Council Act No 64:
Repealed by 7 of the National Strategic Intelligence Act No 39 of 1994.
16 June, The resignation of the Minister of the Interior, Theo Gerdener, is announced and will take effect from 31 July 1972.
The government gives its details of its proposals to consolidate 157 ‘black spots’ and sixty eight Zulu areas into a homeland. Kwazulu will be consolidated as rapidly as possible. However, Chief Gatsha Buthelezi rejects these plans.
23 June, The Malagasy Foreign Minister declares that his country is going to reconsider its policy of dialogue with South Africa.
27 June, South Africa suspends any further dealing with the Malagasy government.
July, The Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) informs the non-racial South African Soccer Federation (SASF), led by Mr. Norman Middleton, that its application for membership arrived too late to be placed before the next congress of FIFA in August. FIFA also clarifies that the White Football Association of South Africa had not been suspended for contravening its rules but because of South African Government policy. Acceptance of FIFA would have meant expulsion of FASA (Football Association of South Africa).
Under pressure from the Commission, the university administration allows a University of Natal Employee Association to be formed. Black workers at UNP and UND hold their first meetings. The first leader of the Durban Committee is Fidelis Ngobese. Issues raised at the first meeting are the use of the words boy and kaffir by White staff members, and the different wages paid to workers of different race.
1 July, Gazankulu holds its first General Assembly.
2 July, Themba Sono is ousted as South African Student Organisation (SASO) President, in a General Student Council meeting held in Hammanskraal. Sono stands for close co-operation between SASO and some homeland leaders. Chief Gatsha Buthelezi is seen by as an undeniable force in South Africa politics. SASO advocates a radical approach towards the homeland leaders, calling them puppets of the Pretoria regime.
12 July, A new black political party, the Black People’s Convention is formed after a three-day conference in Pietermaritzburg. The objective of the Convention is to unite South African blacks into a political organisation seeking to realize their liberation and emancipation from both psychological and physical oppression. It is open only to black members.
14 July, The Minister of Defence, P.W. Botha, announces that Coloureds are to have their own defence force units undergoing twelve months voluntary national service, to be called the South African State Corps Special Service Battalion.
18 July, Stevedores turn out in large numbers at the respective Wage Board sittings in Durban and Cape Town to argue their case for a minimum wage of R18, based on the PDL. Supported by evidence from the Commission, the workers are of the view that they have succeeded in obtaining their wage increases. The slow workings of the Wage Board are such that by October of that year, there is still no news on this.
31 July, The Prime Minister announces that, following the resignation of five members of the Cabinet, he has reorganised his government.
South Africa Signs amendment to the trade agreement of 20 August 1932 with Great Britain.
August, The Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) executive gives special permission to the Football Association of South Africa to have overseas teams participate in the South African Games in Pretoria in 1973, asking for assurance that Blacks would be allowed to watch the games. (South Africa has friends in the FIFA executive; its position in the FIFA Congress is weak. Congress approval was not necessary for the above special permission and the matter was not mentioned at the FIFA Congress in Paris.)
1 August, The Ciskei is given self-government. Chief Justice Mabandla becomes Chief Minister, and the heads of the territory’s six departments become Ministers. The following day Mabandla makes a huge land claim asking for all the white-owned land between the Kei and the Fish Rivers in the Eastern Cape and between the coast and the Orange River
Political activist and trade unionist JB Marks Dies
5 August, The state-owned Atlas Aircraft Corporation is to build an advanced subsonic fighter to be airborne in 1974. Also during the next eighteen months the first Mirage F-I supersonic interceptors being built under licence from France will be in service with the South African Air Force.
7 August, Chief Matanzima (Transkei) outlines proposals for the creation of Xhosaland a new black super-state to include the Transkei, Ciskei and white-owned land between the Fish and Kei Rivers, and East Griqualand.
10 August, Naval Headquarters at Simonstown announce that the second series of joint British South African exercises off the Cape Coast will begin on 14 August 1972 and will continue for seven days.
11 August, The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development declares that no more land will be allocated to the ‘homelands’ other than that stipulated in the 1936 Land Act.
18 August, The first four Bantu Affairs Administration Boards are gazetted. They are intended to facilitate centralized administrative control and improved mobility of labour.
25 August, Harry Schwarz wins the Transvaal party leadership of the United Party (UP) from Marais Steyn.
12 September, Dr. H. Muller is elected as the National Party’s leader in the Transvaal, following the resignation of B. Schoeman. His election is considered to make him the successor-designate to John Vorster as Prime Minister.
28 September, Proposals for the consolidation of ‘homelands’ in the Transvaal which will have the effect of reducing twenty six or twenty-seven specified areas to nine are announced. The purchase of white-owned land, involving a total of 310,000 hectares, for addition to black areas is a long and difficult task.
October - February, A wave of strikes by black workers begins in the autumn of 1972 and escalates dramatically in the first months of 1973, the main centre of unrest being Durban.
October, As the new wages for dockworkers have not yet come into effect, stevedores in Cape Town and Durban embark on a strike. It ends when workers are given an ultimatum to return to work or face retrenchment.
2 October, Lebowa, the Northern Sotho ‘homeland’, becomes the fourth ‘homeland, with Bheshego as its temporary capital. Under its new  constitution there will be a cabinet consisting of a Chief Minister and five other Ministers. External affairs, defence and communications will continue to be controlled by the South African government.
20 October, Lebowa proclaimed a self-governing territory.
25 October, The International Monetary Fund announces it has concurred in a proposal by the government for a change in the par value of the Rand representing a 4.202 percent devaluation in relation to gold but an effective appreciation of Great about 4 percent in comparison with the current market exchange of the Rand.
1 November, At the end of a lengthy trial in the Supreme Court in Pretoria, four Indians Chief are convicted of conspiracy under the Terrorism Act and sentenced to a minimum of five years imprisonment. Their intention was the violent overthrow of the system of government.
2 November, The first session of the newly elected Bophuthatswana Legislative Assembly is opened in Mafikeng by President Fouché.
15 November, The United Nations General Assembly passes six resolutions in plenary denouncing the government’s apartheid policy and various aspects of that policy. Each resolution is sponsored by some fifty African, Asian and Communist countries, the various resolutions receiving in every case over 100 votes in favour, being opposed by South Africa and Portugal and abstentions varying from one to twenty-one votes.
In resolution 2923 E (XXVII), the General Assembly declared that “the United Nations has a vital interest in securing the speedy elimination of apartheid“.
23 November, Passports have been withdrawn from three white staff members of the joint Institute of Race Relations.
December, The new wage determination from the Wage Board comes into effect. It is a R1 increase for stevedores, to a minimum wage of R9,50. This is just under 50% of the R18 PDL mooted by the workers in July. As a result, 2000 workers strike in Durban and 20 are dismissed. Concerned that Cape Town workers would face dismissal if they struck, students in the Commission there encourage workers to write to the Secretary of Labour, and to consider forming a trade union. Pamphlets giving workers advice on how to go about forming a union are distributed.
1 December, South Africa Signs treaty with Great Britain on air services (Hong Kong) via Seychelles.
South Africa Signs amendment to an agreement regarding the establishment of civil air services with Great Britain.
2 December, South Africa Signs International Convention for Containers.
3 December, Theo Gerdener resigns from the National Party on account of his involvement with Action South and Southern Africa (ACASA), an independent organisation dedicated to better communication, which he (UP) founded.
5 December, It is announced that White, Coloured and Asian workers affiliated to the Trade Union Council of South Africa (TUCSA) have voted overwhelmingly in favour of extending full trade union rights to Africans. Minister of Labour Viljoen opposes it.
8 December, South Africa Signs treaty with Swaziland on the avoidance of double taxation and the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income.
16 December, The Black People’s Convention (BPC) holds its first National Congress. Its Constitution declares it intends to preach and popularize the philosophy of Black Consciousness and black solidarity.
The first national congress of the Black Peoples Convention (BPC) is held in Hammanskraal.
Activist Mthuli Shezi, who inspired Black Consciousness ideas through his writings and plays, dies. He is pushed beneath a moving train at Germiston Station for standing up for the dignity of Black women who were being drenched with water by a White station cleaner.
A massive strike begins in Durban.
Under a delimitation carried out to take effect at the next elections the number of seats in the House of Assembly is increased from 166 to 171 generally of benefit to the ruling National Party.
Wave of massive strikes in Natal.
Venda and Gazankulu proclaimed a self-governing territories.
Aliens Control Act No 40:
Exempted Indians from the need to obtain permits for travel between provinces. However, in terms of provincial legislation, Indians were not allowed to stay in the Orange Free State and parts of northern Natal for more than a brief period unless prior permission had been obtained (Dugard 1978: 73).
Repealed by 60 of the Abolition of Racially Based Land Measures Act No 108 of 1991.
Black Labour Relations Regulation Amendment Act 70:
This Act was passed in response to a wave of strikes in 1972 and 1973 (Bendix 1989: 302) and included a limited right to strike. Previously black workers had been completely prohibited from striking.
Repealed by 63 of the Labour Relation Amendment Act No 57 of 1981.
Gazankulu proclaimed a self-governing territory.
Phyllis qualifies as a lawyer but cannot practice because she is banned.
1973
Thabo Mbeki is in Botswana having talks with the Botswana Government about the opening of the African National Congress Offices.
January - February, Durban is swept by a wave of spontaneous strikes by Black workers. This prompts reserved acknowledgment from industry, and attracts worldwide publicity. Though none of the Black organisations can claim credit for the strikes, nonetheless the strikes demonstrate the potential for successful industrial action. Many Black radicals consider the possibility of forming a student-worker alliance. The Black Peoples Convention (BPC) give their support to the Durban strikers.
1 January, Gazankulu: Education Act No 7:
9 January, Workers at the Coronation Brick & Tile factory in Durban down tools and demand first R20, and then R30 per week. This strike sparks off a chain of strikes throughout Durban which, by early February, see almost 30 000 workers on strike throughout Durban.
Students of the Wages Commission are seen in some quarters, particularly by government, to have been agitators. Subsequent interviews with workers play down the role of the Wages Commission in the 73 strikes, citing their disgusting low wages as the main reason for the strikes.
12 January, A notice providing for compulsory education for Indians is gazetted.
18 January, The Kwazulu government issues a document signed by all six Executive Councillors inviting the South African government to test its consolidation plan for the homeland by holding a referendum among all race groups in Natal and Kwazulu.
19 January, Prime Minister Vorster, confirms that the government has not been Earl consulted over Rhodesia’s closure of its border with Zambia, but that the government will assist in opposing terrorism.
23 January, The Prime Minister announces that a first-ever multi-racial commission will investigate the political and socio-economic future of the Coloured community.
24 January, Premier Vorster, decrees that in the future the ‘homelands’ will be allowed to accept direct foreign financial aid.
25 January, South Africa Signs a treaty with the Federal Republic of Germany on double taxation.
26 January, The Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) announced, after a postal ballot of the executive committee, to allow foreign teams to go to South Africa to participate in the South African Games in March.
27 January, Chief Matanzima of the Transkei suggests that a federation between blacks and whites would save South Africa from destruction.
February - April, The government’s reaction to the strikes is a revision of wage levels for unskilled workers; training facilities for blacks; an improvement of communication between black labour and employers.
Widespread industrial unrest among black workers is experienced. The underlying cause is identified as the fact that black workers have assumed increasing importance in the country’s economy, yet they are denied the right to strike or bargain collectively and their trade union is not officially recognized..
February, Rick Turner (UND Lecturer), Neville Curtis, Halton Cheadle, Paula Ensor, David Hemson and David Davis are all served with banning orders. There is a subsequent slump in both Wages Commission and union activities.
1 February, The government grants internal self-government to two further ‘homelands’, namely to Venda and Gazankulu territories.
11 February, The Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) withdraws the special permission it had given to amateur football teams to take part in the South African Games to be held in Pretoria in March-April 1973, when it becomes clear that FASA is planning separate teams for different ethnic groups. FIFA had temporarily lifted suspension on the Football Association of South Africa (FASA) on the understanding that the Games would be multi-racial.
12 February, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty and operating agreement relating to the Intelsat.
19 February, Unrest among black workers over wage improvement continues. Police arrest 244 African workers, of whom 169 are subsequently charged.
20 February, The Minister of Labour announces instructions to the Wage Board to revise certain determinations applying to unskilled labourers in major centres. Minimum wages rise by over thirty per cent.
21 February, The first general elections to the Ciskei’s Legislative Assembly are held in the territory’s nine districts. There are no political parties; the candidates are elected to the twenty elective seats in their individual capacity, the remaining thirty seats are filled by Chiefs appointed ex officio.
27 February, The Commission of Inquiry, appointed by the Prime Minister, to investigate the activities of four organisations, among them the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS) submits a detailed interim report on NUSAS to the Assembly, recommending action against eight NUSAS leaders. The Commission, under the chairmanship of AL. Schlebush, comprises five other National Party MPs and four opposition United Party MPs. The approval of the report by its four UP members is widely criticized.
On the same day banning orders under the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950 are served on eight NUSAS leaders. On the following day violent student clashes take place in Johannesburg.
March, The Portuguese Foreign Minister, Dr. Rul Patricio, pays a five-day official visit to South Africa. He declares, on 6 March 1973, that there are no plans for a military alliance between Portugal, South Africa and Rhodesia.
March, Initially the government views the Black Consciousness movement as apparently supportive of their 'separate development' ideology, and thus tolerates them. Later clamp-downs see bannings of South African Students' Organisation (SASO) and Black People’s Convention (BPC) leaders Steve Biko, Barney Pityana and six others.
2 March, It is announced in Johannesburg that restriction orders have been issued against six leaders of the South African Students Organisation (SASO) and against two men closely associated with the Black People’s Convention (BPC).
3 March, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on international trade in endangered species of wild flora and fauna.
4 March, In the British House of Commons the Trade and Industry Sub-Committee of the Select Committee on Expenditure proposes an inquiry ‘To investigate how far wages and conditions of employment of African workers employed by British companies in South Africa represent a factor affecting investment prospects, export performance, and the reputation abroad of British industry’. The proposal is accepted.
8 March, The Minister of Justice defends the banning orders on eight black leaders on the grounds that he is preventing acts of terrorism worse than any previously experienced. The opposition queries why, in such a case, the leaders are not taken to court.
The Prime Minister, B.J. Vorster, officially opens the South African Navy’s R15m. Maritime Operational and Communications Headquarters at Silvermine, near Simonstown.
12 March, In the wake of strikes in Natal in February, The Guardian publishes a documented report on the low wages paid to black workers in South Africa by companies with British connections.
14 March, The Supreme Council for Sports in Africa (SCSA) asks the national Olympic committees of Belgium, Great Britain, Japan, the Netherlands and West Germany, to do everything in their power to prevent members of their respective countries from participating in the Pretoria Games from 23 March to 7 April 1973.
20 March, Sports Minister, Dr. P. Koornhof, says the government will not allow organisations inside or outside the country to disrupt the South African games.
Evidence of guerrilla training in the Soviet Union and Tanzania is given in the trial of six people, on nineteen charges under the Terrorism Act, appearing before Justice Boshoff in Pretoria.
21 March, The banning orders on NUSAS leaders are discussed by the Principals of four English language universities with the Prime Minister, who is unsympathetic. Extra-Parliamentary action to bring about change in the form of government in South Africa will not be tolerated.
Black Laws Amendment Act No 7:
Designed to speed up the planning for partial consolidation of homelands. The 1927 Black Administration Act was amended so that ‘a removal order might be served on a Bantu Community as well as on a tribe or portion thereof’ (Horrell 1978: 205). If a tribe refused to move, and Parliament approved the plan, the tribe was unable to appeal to Parliament.
Repealed by the Abolition of Influx Control Act No 68 of 1986.
27 March, A major detailed Administration statement is made by the United States Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, David Newsom, to the African Sub-Committee of the House of Representatives, chaired by Congressman Charles Diggs concerning American business involvement in South Africa. It stresses that peaceful change in South Africa can be fostered if American firms promote better conditions for blacks.
29 March, The British government publishes in Trade and Industry, guidelines for British companies operating in South Africa.
3 April, Chief Kaiser Matanzima (Transkei) calls for a federation of white and black states in South Africa. His party stands for a policy of separation of races on an equal and parallel basis, rejecting racial discrimination and white dominance.
9 April, The International Commission of Jurists condemns the bannings of black leaders.
The New Zealand Prime Minister announces that the invitation to an all-white South African rugby team had to be withdrawn because of its racial selection.
International Conference of Experts for Support of Victims of Colonialism and Apartheid in Southern Africa, Oslo.
10 April, Minister of Defence, P.W. Botha, defines South Africa’s defence policy in a White Paper tabled in the House of Assembly. While primarily defensive, the policy must also include a significant retaliatory capability.
11 April, Forty members are elected to Lebowa’s Legislative Assembly, the remaining sixty seats being allocated to nominated chiefs. Cedric Phatudi becomes is Chief Minister.
14 April, The Bophuthatswana government rejects the South African government’s consolidation proposals and, in return, claims large portions of North Western and Western Transvaal and sizeable areas of the Northern Cape and the Free State.
Signs multilateral treaty on the issue of telegraph and telephone regulations.
20 April, The South African Police Force stationed in the Caprivi Strip, bordering Zambia, suffer casualties in clashes with ‘terrorists’.
24 April, The ambush and killing of policemen by Zambian based terrorists is reported from the Caprivi Strip. Zambia denies that it harbours freedom fighters’.
25 April, Prime Minister Vorster, confirms in the House of Assembly that the blacks would receive all the land provided for in the 1936 Native Trust and Land Act.
The Schlebusb Commission of Inquiry issues its third interim report, focusing on the Wilgespruit Fellowship Centre, an institution stated to be working towards radical social and political change and employing procedures counter to accepted religion and religious practice. The Prime Minister gives its controlling body, the South African Council of Churches (SACC) three weeks to clear it up.
27 April, Details of the government’s final consolidation proposals for the ‘homelands’ involving land in the provinces of Natal and Transvaal are given at a press conference by the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, M.C. Botha. They are tabled in Parliament and approved on.
29 April, The Prime Minister indicates that the ‘homelands’ will be perfectly free to form a federation among themselves, once they have achieved hill independence. However he is not prepared to share the sovereignty of the white people with any other national group.
4 May, The Minister for Bantu Administration and Development hands over the symbols of authority to the Kwazulu Legislative Authority.
12 May, A Bill prohibiting demonstrations near the Houses of Parliament in Cape Town is passed with the support of the opposition United Party.
15 May, The British Trade and Industry Sub-Committe holds eighteen public sittings; twenty eight companies give oral evidence, 100 others written evidence. Most state they have given unscheduled wage increases to black workers in the period before and during the House of Commons inquiry.
16 May, The Minister of Justice banns all protest meetings in the centre of Cape Town, following student protests. Several arrests are made.
18 May, Signs multilateral treaty on the issue of the simplification and harmonization of customs procedures.
21 May, The Bantu Labour Relations Regulation Amendment Bill is read for the first time in the House of Assembly. It creates more effective machinery for communication between employers and African workers and gives the Minister of Labour wide powers to stimulate improvements in working conditions. Africans are given a more direct role in wage negotiations.
24 May, In connection with the uranium enrichment programme, disclosed by the Prime Minister in July 1970, his announced in the House of Assembly that the government has decided to make funds available for preparatory work for establishing a full-scale prototype plant for the economic enrichment of uranium.
25 May, Final land consolidation proposals for Bophuthatswana are announced. They involve moving more than 120,000 Tswana people from their present lands.
The Minister of Sport and Recreation, Dr. P.G.J. Koornhof, announces in the House of Assembly that the Government had given approval for the staging in 1974 of an open national soccer tournament in which the different South African nations can participate on a multinational basis. This is that a South African representative white team, a South African representative Coloured team, a South African representative Indian team and a South African representative Zulu, Xhosa or any other Bantu (sic) national team can compete in the tournament.
A Whites-only team beats a Blacks-only team twice in the multi-national South African Games (4-0; 3-1) at the Rand Stadium, Johannesburg.
26 May, A comprehensive policy statement on South Africa’s new multi-national sports concessions is made by Sports Minister Dr. P. Koornhof in the House of Assembly. Separate participation will be maintained at club, provincial and national levels. Mixed competition will be only at international level.
6 June, Resettlement of 363,000 Africans is expected to result. Gatsha Buthelezi protests over the limited concessions and threatens non-cooperation.
15 June, International Trade Union Conference against Apartheid - organised by the Workers' Group of the ILO Governing Body, in cooperation with the UN Special Committee against Apartheid, at Palais des Nations, Geneva.
20 June, Prison sentences ranging from five to fifteen years are imposed by Justice W.G. Boshoff in Pretoria on six defendants convicted under the Terrorism Act. They are found guilty of various charges including conspiring in South Africa, the Soviet Union, Somalia and Britian with the ANC, to overthrow the South African government by force and preparing for violent revolution.
The Minister of Defence denies that South African troops are supporting Portuguese armed forces in Mozambique, as alleged by FREL1MO.
July - September, ‘Homeland’ leaders Chief Buthelezi, Professor Ntsanwisi, and TM. Molahlawa warn the South African government of worsening race relations.
4 July, The Bantu Labour Regulations Amendment Bill becomes operative. The conditions under which Africans - for the first time - have the legal right to strike, the procedures to be followed, and the exclusion from it of certain essential services categories of workers are laid down.
20 July, The Minister of Coloured Affairs announces that the government has decided to appoint a judicial commission to investigate student grievances and conduct at the University of the Western Cape, closed between 11 June and 15 July 1973, following various demands and protests.
28 July, The Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration and Education, Punt Janson, invites guidance in humanizing the pass laws and influx control measures by which African mobility is regulated, in the interests of the communities.
30 July, The former Minister of the Interior, Theo Gerdener, announces details of his scheme for a new political organisation whose aim will be to work for two separate states in South Africa, one for Africans and the other for White, Indian and Coloured peoples with equality for all.
August, Banning orders continue. Passports are refused, or withdrawn.
1 August, A High Court is established in Umtata, capital of the Transkei. The first Chief Justice sworn in is a white South African.
7 August, Students strike at the University of Fort Hare. The Students Organisation (SASO) is held responsible for the agitation. Further violence erupts on the campus on 28 August 1973.
15 August, Elections are held in Venda. Traditionalist Chief Patrick R. Mphephu is returned to power despite electoral victory for the opposition Vendaland Independent People’s Party, additional seats being filled by nominated headmen.
24 August, South Africa Signs treaty with Lesotho relating to the establishment of an office for a Lesotho government labour representative in South Africa.
South Africa Signs boundary treaty with Botswana.
Legal Aid Act No 2:
Provided legal aid for blacks, which was absent in the South African setting.
25 August, The Prime Minister warns the opposition parties, the United Party and Progressive Party, that his government may have to end interference by whites in the political affairs of Africans and vice-versa. He is particularly opposed to representatives of black and Coloured communities being invited to speak at their congresses which can only heighten friction between racial groups.
29 August, Signs treaty with Brazil regarding the exemption from customs duties to consuls and consulates of both states.
September, The Premier of West German Schleswig-Holstein says during a visit to South Africa that more German entrepreneurs should be attracted to the ‘homelands’.
11 September, Eleven rioting miners are shot by police and twenty-seven injured at the Western Deep Levels mine, Carltonville in a confrontation arising from a pay dispute. The incident arouses international concern.
13 September, Chief Gatsha Buthelezi, the Chief Councillor, announces that the South African government has agreed that members of the Kwazulu Executive Council should be allowed to possess firearms.
20 September, The United States House of Representatives Judiciary Sub-Committee opens an inquiry into the South African operations of 320 American firms, with a view to determining whether they follow fair employment practices.
24 September, Gazankulu: Social Pensions Act No 7: 
25 September, The New Zealand government announces that it terminates all tariff preferences previous granted to South Africa, as from 1 January 1974.
October, A plan is launched by the government and leading blacks, for the formation of twenty-two councils to represent the country’s 6,000,000 urban Africans.
3 October, Prime Minister Vorster indicates that there is nothing to prevent employers taking the necessary steps to bring about improvements in the productive use of black labour. The government will not obstruct changes in the country’s traditional work patterns.
5 October, The Minister of Labour exercises his power under the Bantu Labour Relations Regulation Bill to order minimum wage increases of between fifty and ninety per cent for a large proportion of the more than 100,000 Africans employed in the civil engineering and road-making industries in main urban areas.
The United Nations General Assembly rejects South Africa’s credentials. The Assembly President rules, however, that the measure does not affect the delegations right to participate, and the Prime Minister affirms South Africa’s intention to remain in the United Nations despite mounting opposition.
A State Presidential Proclamation, widening powers of the Group Areas Act, is published in a bid to prevent multi-racial matches at Pietermaritzburg’s Aurora Cricket Club.
7 October, A delegation of British Trade Union leaders carry out an intensive programme of visits and talks, investigating trade union conditions and meeting the Prime Minister and several other government ministers. Their leader, Victor Feather, President of the European Trade Union Confederation, outlines a six point plan for industrial prosperity and black workers advancement. The government rejects it.
12 October, The Minister of Labour says that the government will neither abolish job reservation nor recognize black trade unions.
16 October, Signs treaty with Spain for the prevention of double taxation on income derived from the operation of ships or aircraft in international traffic.
16 October, Elections are held in Gazankulu. Professor Hudson Ntsanwisi is unanimously re-elected leader of the Gazankulu Legislative Assembly.
19 October, KwaZulu: Medium of Instruction and Language Act No 5:
21 October, It is reported that the government has banned twenty black leaders of black organisations, including the South African Students’ Organisation (SASO), the Black People’s Convention (BPC) the Black Community Programme (BCP), the Black Allied Workers’ Union and the Black Workers’ Project. Members of the South African Black Scholars’ Association (SABSA) are interrogated security police.
24 October, In the elections the Transkei National Independence Party wins twenty-five seats, the Democratic Party ten, Independents eight. Another sixty-four Assembly seats are filled by chiefs appointed ex officio by the government.
27 October, The Carltonville inquests exonerates the police from any blame for the shootings at the Western Deep Levels on 11 September 1973, in which eleven black miners were killed and which caused an international outcry.
8 November, A meeting convened by Chief Lucas Mangope, Chief Minister of Bophuthatswana, held in Umtata in camera and attended by eight ‘homeland’ leaders to work out a common approach to the. government, lay emphasis on the concept of one black nation. Resolutions are passed for the establishment of a black bank, abolition of influx control and consolidation of ‘homelands’ into single units.
9 November, At its Biennial Congress in Bloemfontein the United Party adopts a new six-point declaration of principles, and ratifies a new federal plan committed to a federal constitution.
The Progressive Party supports the idea of a federation of autonomous states in Southern Africa.
16 November, Dr. Beyers Naudé, Director of the Christian Institute is found guilty by a Pretoria regional court of refusing to testify before the Schlebusch Commission, because its hearings were held in secret.
17 November, The Democratic Party officially comes into being at a one-day conference in Johannesburg attended by some 200 delegates from the four provinces. Theo Gerdener is unanimously elected leader of the party.
28 November, An Arab oil embargo against South Africa, brings the prospects of rationing and the extension of conservation measures.
30 November, The United Nations General Assembly adopts, by ninety one votes to four, the Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid. To become international law its ratification by twenty countries is still required.
International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid approved by the General Assembly [Resolution 3068(XXVIII)].
4 December, Following the placing of an embargo on the supply of oil to South Africa from Arab countries, the Prime Minister announces restricted trading hours, but states that petrol rationing is not as yet being introduced.
7 December, Further bannings are gazetted, including that of the former leader of the South African Indian Congress, Yusuf Cachalia who has already spent twenty years under restriction.
11 December, Land consolidation proposals for the Transkei and Ciskei are announced, involving black acquisition of Port St Johns and Indwe.
14 December, The United Nations adopts a resolution declaring that the South African government has no right to represent the people of that country and that representation should instead be vested in the African national liberation movements.
The General Assembly declared that the South African regime has “no right to represent the people of South Africa“ and that the liberation movements recognised by the OAU are “the authentic representatives of the overwhelming majority of the South African people“. [Resolution 3151 G (XXVIII)]
15 December, The British Trade Union Congress (TUC) publishes a report on black labour conditions. Among the major recommendations it advocates is the organisation of black workers into trade unions.
19 December, South Africa signs International Sugar Agreement.
24 December, Signs agreement with Botswana relating to the establishment of a Botswana government labour representative in South Africa.
The United Nations General Assembly (under the chairpersonship of the Algerian Foreign Minister) refuses to recognise the credentials of the South African delegation, a significant victory for the ANC.
Fietas, Johannesburg: The Oriental Plaza is established, but stands virtually empty until 1976 when unwilling traders are forcibly removed from their shops in Pageview.
The performance of Black drama and music by mushrooming township cultural groups becomes a significant factor in the dispersal of Black Consciousness philosophy.
QwaQwa proclaimed a self-governing territory.
Prisons Act No 6: Set out prison services in Transkei.
Lebowa: Education Act No 6:
Baleka Kgositsile is active in the Black Consciousness Movement and the ANC underground.
Mamphela Ramphele is charged under the Suppression of Communism Act for being in possession of banned literature.
When 11 and in Std. 3 (Grade 5), Robert McBride's father makes him read “Coloured: A profile of 2 million South Africans“ by Al J. Venter, an unusually progressive book for its time. The book draws attention to the contribution of Coloured people in the struggle against apartheid, some of whom went into exile and chose violent resistance. It introduces McBride to Coloured political activists such as James April, Don Mattera, Jakes Gerwel, Basil February and his own uncle, Rev. Clive McBride. Discussions that Robert has with his father around these issues create a lasting impression in him.
1974
Through a childhood friend, Andre Koopman, Robert McBride is further politicized. Andre is influenced by an elder friend, Ashley, a medical student at Natal University's Alan Taylor Residence right next door to Wentworth, Robert's home.
Through Ashley, Robert is introduced to the politics of the regenerating trade union movement, Black Consciousness (including the writing of Steve Biko) and the Frelimo independence movement in Mozambique.
Winnie and Peter Magubane lose their appeals and each begin their six months jail sentence for communicating with each other when prohibited from doing so. Winnie is cited women of the year by British women.
A Whites-only team defeats a Blacks-only team (2-0) in the Embassy Multinational Series at the Rand Stadium.
Thabo Mbeki begins to train South African Students who escapes from South Africa to join the African National Congress in exile. After training them they are sent to African National Congress camps in Mozambique and Zambia.
1 January, With effect from this date the New Zealand government terminates all tariff preferences previously granted to South Africa.
4 January, The leader of the United Party in the Transvaal, Harry Swartz, signs a five-point ‘declaration of faith’ with Chief Gatsha Buthelezi of Kwazulu. Its purpose is to provide a blueprint for government by consent and racial peace in a multi-racial society, stressing opportunity for all, consultation, the federal concept, and a Bill of Rights.
30 January, The United Party controlled Johannesburg City Council announces the dismantling of petty apartheid practices.
February, The report of the one-man Commission of Inquiry into the University of the Western Cape by Justice IT. van Wyk urges that disruption and incitement at all South African universities be made a legally punishable offence.
1 February, Abraham Tiro, a leader of the South African Students’ Organisation, who after his expulsion from Turfloop University in 1972 had fled the country in September 1973, is killed by a parcel bomb near Gaborone, Botswana.
The assassination of Onkgopotse Abram Tiro occurs. A Bureau of State Security (BOSS) hit squad, also known as the Z-Squad, is responsible for sending him a parcel bomb. As a result, Black students boycott lectures and their institutions are forced to shut down.
4 February, The Prime Minister announces the holding of early elections. The National Party bases its election campaign on its record in office over the previous twenty-six years and on the need for a strong government.
8 February, The Prime Minister warns that the government will not hesitate to intervene, should campaigns by City Councils - led by Johannesburg - to eliminate petty apartheid measures cause friction, or disturb the peace.
The Minister of Justice, P.C. Pelser discloses in Parliament that during 1973 a total of sixty-seven people were banned by the government for political reasons. Of these sixteen were prosecuted and eleven convicted for not complying with their restriction orders.
9 February, The Publications and Entertainments Bill placed by the government before the House of Assembly incorporated the recommendations of the Commission of Inquiry chaired by Jimmy Kruger, Deputy Minister of the Interior. The most controversial section abolishes the existing right of appeal from the Publications Control Board decisions to the Supreme Court - regarded by the opposition United Party as a damaging blow to the rule of law.
18 February, The Lebanese government decides to break off diplomatic relations with South Africa.
23 February, The Prime Minister condemns, in the strongest terms, a gift of $450,000 announced by the World Council of Churches (WCC) to Southern African liberation movements.
March, Harri Singh goes on a trip to Europe to raise funds for the Black People’s Convention (BPC) without any success.
6 March, The British Parliamentary Report on Black Labour Conditions indicate that sixty-three of 141 British companies investigated have been paying African workers below the relevant poverty line. Three main recommendations are made the British government should initiate a new code of practice for British finns operating in South Africa; British companies should pay African workers not less than the minimum effective level and should encourage the lawful development of collective bargaining.
What is officially described as the first meeting of its kind, the Prime Minister holds a one-day conference with the black ‘homeland’ leaders to discuss mainly economic and urbanization questions.
14 March, Chief Matanzima calls upon the South African government to grant full independence to the Transkei within five years. The Prime Minister states that he is prepared to negotiate.
15 March, The creation of a community of separate and sovereign states is laid down as the official policy of the National Party in its election manifesto. Simultaneously it rejects absolutely a federal system.
Two Bills conferring wide new security powers on the government are passed by Parliament. The Affected Organisations Act is intended to prevent such organisations from receiving financial support from overseas sources to achieve political objectives in South Africa. The Riotous Assemblies Amendment Act empowers the authorities to prohibit any public or private gathering of more than one person, whether lawful or unlawful, if it is thought to pose a threat to law and order. Both Acts are strongly opposed by the United Party and the Progressive Party.
Riotous Assemblies Amendment Act No 30:
Redefined ‘gathering’ and removed the reference to ‘public’. A gathering could comprise any number of persons.
Sections 1-8 and 11 repealed by the Internal Security Act No 74 of 1982.
IN FORCE: Sections 9 and 10 (dealing with ss 16-18 of the Riotous Assemblies Act No 17 of 1956): CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE.
Affected Organisations Act No 31:
Provided for the declaration of Affected Organisations. Such organisations could not solicit foreign funds.
Repealed by 7 of the Abolition of Restrictions on Free Political Activity Act No 206 of 1993.
18 March, At the close of nominations for the 1974 elections a total of 334 candidates have been nominated for 171 seats: National Party 137, United Party 110, Herstigte Nasionale Party 46, Progressive Party 23, Democratic Party 7 and others 11.
The Minister of the Interior, Connie Mulder, announces that senior officials of the World Council of Churches (WCC) have been banned from South Africa. Entry will be refused to any member of the Council’s Executive or Central Committee.
20 March, Responding to the British Labour government’s re-imposition of an embargo on arms sales to South Africa, John Vorster tells Britain that South Africa does not depend on British arms.
Signs agreement with Swaziland on the issue of notes and coin.
25 March, South Africa Signs amendment with Great Britain to the agreement on civil air services signed on 26 October 1945.
29 March, Chief Minister Cedric Phatudi of Lebowa signs the ‘Seshego Declaration’ with the United Party Transvaal leader, Harry Schwarz and the United Party M.P. for Durban North aiming at peaceful change, a federal system –and a stake in society for blacks.
April, The President of Paraguay, A. Stroessner, pays a five-day State visit to South Africa. Paraguay is given a $20m. loan for agricultural development. Agreements are signed on economic cooperation.
2 April, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on the extension of the Wheat Trade Convention, 1971.
3 April, South Africa Signs treaty with Paraguay on cultural exchanges and cooperation in science and technology.
4 April, Following the aircrash death of over seventy miners, President Banda unilaterally suspends labour recruitment to South Africa. The move leads to protracted, but inconclusive negotiations for better conditions for migrant workers.
8 April, The Prime Ministers of Lesotho and South Africa meet to clear up certain misunderstandings and reaffirm their belief and determination that both countries base their relations on the principle of good neighbourliness.
24 April, The general elections result in the return of the National Party for the seventh consecutive time since 1948. While the United Party suffers a setback the Progressive Party increases its representation from one seat to six. The newly created Democratic Party has no success and the Herstigte Nasionale Party meets with resounding defeat.
25 April, The World Council of Churches (WCC) calls for an end to multi-million pound investment in South Africa by international banks, to help bring about the collapse of the economy and the end of apartheid. The report, commissioned by the council, is released simultaneously in London, Geneva, Frankfurt and New York.
26 April, The Minister of Defence, P.W. Botha, announces an expansion programme for the naval base at Simonstown.
29 April, A number of Cabinet changes are announced by the Prime Minister.
30 April, The claims of the government of Lebowa to more than one third of the total area of the Transvaal are set out in a report of the Select Committee of Inquiry into the Consolidation of Lebowa, tabled in the Lebowa Legislative Assembly by the Minister of the Interior, C. Ramusi.
The new government decides that the Senate will be dissolved by the Stale President and replaced by an enlarged Upper House at the end of May.
6 May, The British Lions rugby team leave London to begin a controversial twenty-two match tour of South Africa and Rhodesia, ignoring threats by the Supreme Council for Sport in Africa (SCSA). Kenya, Zambia, Tanzania and Uganda sever all sporting links with Britain.
17 May, After a two-hour discussion, the Transkei and South African governments agree to appoint a committee of experts to prepare the way for Transkei independence. An assurance is given by Chief Kaiser Matanzima that the Transkei will continue as a democratic multi-party system after its independence.
21 May, The British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, states in the House of Commons that the export license for a Westland Wasp helicopter to South Africa will be revoked.
22 May, The South African Olympic and National Games Association (SAONGA) reports that all South Africa’s attempts to secure re-admission to the Olympic Games have failed, despite the tremendous strides made to comply with the demands of the IOC.
Signs an amendment to the agreement on civil uses of atomic energy with the United States.
29 May, After joint talks with Ian Smith of Rhodesia, the Prime Minister B.J. Vorster commits South Africa to co-operative coexistence with, and non-interference in the internal affairs of a black-ruled Mozambique. A reciprocal pledge is forthcoming from FRELIMO’s Joachim Chissano on 17 September 1974.
30 May, Following the elections, ten new senators are chosen and appointed by the Prime Minister, on the same day that the electoral colleges elect their forty-four Provincial Senators.
South Africa tells Britain that unless the Wasp helicopter is delivered the Simonstown Agreement on naval cooperation will have to be reviewed.
3 June, Mr. Norman Middleton, president of the South African Soccer Federation, is refused a passport to attend a meeting of the International Football Federation (FINA) in Frankfurt on 11 June. He had refused to give an undertaking to the Minister of the Interior that he would do nothing to harm South African sport at the Frankfurt meeting. He said he considered the issue of a conditional passport to be blackmail.
5 June, The Japanese government announces that South Africans will no longer be granted visas to enter Japan, to take part in sporting, cultural or educational activities. The ban comes into effect on 15 June 1974.
15 June, Minister of Defence P.W. Botha, announces during a press visit to the Caprivi Strip that the Defence Force has taken over protection of the country’s northern borders as a full military operation, replacing the police in the area. Zambia protests over this change. It becomes clear that South Africa is recruiting, arming and training blacks for its army anti-terrorists units to repel a possible guerrilla onslaught on its northern border.
20 June, South Africa Signs amendment to multilateral agreement of 26 July 1967 for the application of safeguards (IAEA/SA/USA).
21 June, The Minister of Finance announces a change in the South African exchange rate practice. Henceforward the Rand is tied strictly to the U.S. dollar.
30 June, Hezekiel Sepeng is Born
Cooperation with Iran in the fields of nuclear energy, petroleum, mining and trade is announced.
July, The leader of the opposition party, Cohn Eghin, together with F. van Zyl Slabbert, undertakes a fact-finding tour of several African countries, including Botswana, Kenya, Nigeria and Zambia.
Removals of thousands of Africans are taking place near Middleburg in the Eastern Transvaal, and more are planned for the Eastern Cape Albany district.
7 July, New Zealand imposes a blanket ban on virtually all visits by sports teams from South Africa.
11 July, Strikes in Durban, common since January 1973, continue as white mechanics and engineers join the ranks of some 400 black and coloured workers.
22 July, The Deputy Chairman of the Coloured Representative Council, JA. Rabie, calls for full citizenship for Coloured people, and urges a separate voters roll to elect sixty Coloured representatives to Parliament and the Provincial Councils.
23 July, Following criticism of the press, particularly the English press, by the Prime Minister, a code of conduct is adopted by the National Press Union which is criticised by newspaper editors and certain academics.
24 July, Dissatisfaction with the Coloured Persons Representative Council (CPRC) climaxes with a motion of no confidence in separate development. This is followed, on 29 July, by a walkout of the Federal Party after its third defeat in three days by the Labour Party, led by Sonny Leon.
30 July, The Cabinet meets to discuss the crisis in the government policy towards the coloured community, following the capture of the Coloured Representative Council (CRC) by the anti-Apartheid Labour Party. The government has prorogued the Council until further notice.
31 July, In a by-election held in Natal the United Party candidate wins a seat against the Democratic Party candidate. The ruling National Party did not contest the seat.
The South African Council of Churches adopts a resolution, at its national conference, that a just war cannot be fought in defence of a basically unjust society.
1 August, Signs treaty with the Federal Republic of Germany relating to the visit of the German nuclear-powered vessel Otto Hahn.
It is officially announced that the police’s counter-insurgency potential will be increased by the establishment of a long-service volunteer unit to fight ‘terrorists’ in Rhodesia.
The government expands its defence potential by enrolling blacks for defence services. This policy has the support of ‘homeland’ leaders.
12 August, The Commission of Inquiry into Certain Organisations submits its final report on NUSAS to Parliament. It finds that its leaders are traitors, guilty of providing terrorist groups and the like. The Commission reconunends that the application of students to NUSAS should end and that NUSAS should not be allowed to accept funds from overseas.
14 August, South African Trade Unionist Raymond Budd dies
A sharp increase in defence expenditure is announced. This follows the White Paper tabled on 10 April 1973, by the Minister of Defence. This demand was necessary for the strengthening of the defence force on the borders of the Caprivi Strip with Angola and Zambia.
19 August, The Prime Minister meets for four hours in Cape Town with a delegation of politicians from the Coloured Representative Council (CRC), led by Sonny Leon. He informs them that the government cannot meet their demands.
26 August, A Defence Bill is passed laying down penalties for any person or organisation inciting anyone to avoid military service.
1 September, KwaZulu: Labour Amendment Act No 11:
3 September, Joint routine exercises are held between the British Royal Navy and the South African Navy, under the Simonstown Agreement, and again from 14 October 1974.
5 September, The Prime Minister again meets Coloured leaders in Cape Town in an attempt to resolve the crisis in the government’s Coloured policy.
9 September, The U.K. Department of Trade confirms that all arms sales to South Africa are halted.
10 September, The Minister of Defence states that South Africa will provide bases and communication facilities to the maritime forces of Western nations interested in the defence of the Cape route.
11 September, The government is empowered to set up a Publications Board which would endeavour to present and uphold the Christian view of life.
13 September, The Minister of Justice officially announces that NUSAS has been declared an ‘affected organisation’ under the Affected Organisations Act and will not be allowed to retain any funds obtained from overseas.
16 September, The United States decides to sell helicopters and reconnaissance aircraft to South Africa.
The Minister of Defence announces that South Africa will soon build its own tanks.
The Beeld is Published for the first time.
19 September, The Prime Minister wishes the new Mozambique government well, but warns that South Africa will have to act in self-defence if Mozambique makes its territory available to guerrilla forces as a base for direct attacks against South Africa.
21 September, Prime Minister Vorster made secret visit to Ivory Coast for talks with President Houphouet-Boigny.
22 September, The Prime Minister pays a secret visit to the Ivory Coast in pursuit of his policy of seeking dialogue with black African states.
23 September, The United States government officially advises American companies operating in South Africa to negogiate with (unregistered) African trade unions.
24 September, KwaZulu: Chiefs and Headmen Act No 8:
25 September, The New Zealand government announces that it terminates all tariff preferences previously granted to South Africa, as from 1 January 1974.
“Viva Frelimo' Rallies are held by the Black People's Convention (BPC) and South African Students' Organisation (SASO) to celebrate the fall of the Portuguese government in Mozambique. The police subsequently suppress the rallies by means of bans and detentions. The “South African Students' Organisation (SASO) Nine“, are charged under the Terrorism Act for encouraging disorder at the time of the Frelimo support rallies. Rather than contributing to the suppression of Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) ideology as the government hoped to achieve, the seventeen month long trial merely serves to disseminate the ideology even more widely, giving the accused a continuous public platform through the press.
26 September, The United Nations General Assembly’s Political Committee decides to grant observer status to the ANC and the PAC. The South African delegation is subsequently withdrawn from the Political Committee.
30 September, The United Nations General Assembly asks the Security Council to review the relationship between the United Nations and South Africa in the light of the constant violation by South Africa of the principles of the Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The General Assembly decided - by 98 votes to 23, with 14 abstentions - not to accept the credentials of the representatives of South Africa.
At the same meeting, the Assembly adopted - by 125 votes to 1, with 9 abstentions - a resolution calling upon the Security Council “to review the relationship between the United Nations and South Africa in the light of the constant violation by South Africa of the principles of the Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.“ [Resolution 3207 (XXIX)]
7 October, South Africa Signs regional agreement on low frequency and medium frequency broadcasting in ITU regions 1 and 3.
8 October, The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development states that, in 1973, 475,387 foreign Africans were working in South Africa. Of these 36,480 were from Botswana, 148,856 from Lesotho. 139,714 from Malawi, 129,198 from Mozambique, 3,249 from Rhodesia, 10,032 from Swaziland and the remainder from other African territories.
9 October, The Publications Act replaces the Publications Control Board with an entirely new censorship machine operative at three different levels. A fundamental change is the specific exclusion of appeal to the courts.
12 October, Fourteen people, including leading members of the South African Students Organisation (SASO) and the Black People’s Convention (BPC) are arrested and held under the Terrorism Act, following the pro-FRELIMO rally in Durban on 25 September 1974. Their arrest is the signal for widespread unrest at the University of the North, Turfloop.
14 October, The Minister of Sport, Piet Koornhof, announces a relaxation of apartheid rules for sport and declares the government is working towards eliminating racial discrimination in the selection of contestants for international events.
The Minister of Sport, Dr. Piet Koornhof, says in the House of Assembly that the Governments aim is to move away from discrimination in sport, disclosing that a champion of champions soccer tournament would be held, probably in February: White and non-White clubs could take part. Further, he invites the major cricketing bodies for round table talks on their problems. He confirms that a Black boxer would meet a White boxer for the South African championship. Under specific questioning, he replied that the Coloured Proteas could play against the Rugby Springboks any time.
15 October, A Second General Law Amendment Bill is introduced by the Minister of Justice, J.T. Kruger, involving the repeal of the ‘Masters and Servants’ laws governing the employment of labourers on farms, in mines, and of domestic workers. The Bill is passed late in October with the support of the opposition.
The United Nations Secretary-General accepts the credentials of the South African delegation led by ‘Pik Botha and including, for the first time, three black delegates, Chief Kaiser Matanzima (Transkei), Dr. M.B. Naidoo (South African Indian Council), and Dan Ulster (Coloured People’s Representative Council.
18 October, The Security Council considered the relationship between the United Nations and South Africa, and received a proposal to recommend to the General Assembly the immediate expulsion of South Africa from the United Nations in compliance with Article 6 of the Charter. The proposal received 10 votes in favour, but was not adopted because of the negative votes of three permanent members - France, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.
23 October, The Prime Minister makes a major policy speech in the Senate, promising that South Africa will contribute its share to order, development and technical and monetary aid to African countries, particularly to close neighbours.
24 October, In the United Nations Security Council ‘Pik’ Botha says that South Africa will do everything in its power to move away from discrimination based on race or colour.
25 October, Cameroon, Kenya, Mauritania and Iraq call for the expulsion of South Africa from the United Nations. The proposition is vetoed by Britain, France and the United States. The vote on South Africa’s expulsion constitutes the first on the specific question of expelling a member country and also the first in which there is a triple veto.
30 October, The main report of the Van Wyk de Vries Commission of Inquiry into Universities is tabled. It advances some positive recommendations, while in a minority report, G.R. Bozzoli, Principal of the University of the Witwatersrand, warns that certain chapters represent an attack on the English-language universities.
1 November, A seventh black ‘homeland’, Qwa-Qwa, becomes self-governing.
Signs multilateral treaty on safety of life at sea.
4 November, The Chamber of Mines secures the Rbodesian government’s approval for the recruitment of black labour from Rhodesia.
5 November, In a major policy speech, the Prime Minister talks of peace with black Africa, and of close economic ties in Southern Africa. He asks for six months’ grace for South Africa, and requests political commentators to ‘give South Africa a chance’.
6 November, At the National Party’s Cape Province Congress, four Cabinet Ministers call for changes and the removal of unnecessary irritating legislation.
The South African Indian Council ceases to be totally government-appointed when half of its thirty seats are filled by election.
The executive committee of the International Football Federation (FIFA) rejects an Ethiopian proposal to expel South Africa. It decides that the matter can be dealt with only at the next congress, during the Olympic Games in Montreal, in 1976. South Africa remains suspended, meaning that foreign players, not teams, can still be imported to South Africa. FIFA decides to send a delegation to South Africa early in 1975 to investigate conditions.
8 November, The Prime Minister’s major proposal for the Coloured people is the creation of a consultative cabinet with equal numbers of white ministers and Council representatives meeting under his chairmanship. This ‘new deal’ is rejected by leaders of the Coloured community, by the leader of the Labour Party and by the Opposition parties.
Penny Heyns is born
12 November, At a request made by the Permanent Representative of Tanzania, representing the African Group of the United Nations, the South African Delegation is refused participation in the Session of the UN General Assembly.
Asked for an interpretation of the decision not to accept the credentials of the South African delegation, the President of the General Assembly, Abdelaziz Bouteflika (Algeria) said that the consistency with which the Assembly had refused to accept the credentials of the South African delegation was tantamount to saying in explicit terms that the General Assembly refused to allow the South African delegation to participate in its work. The President’ ruling was challenged and upheld by a vote of 91 to 22, with 19 abstentions.
16 November, Six of the eight ‘homeland’ leaders meet United Party leaders and issue a statement supporting federation as the solution for South Africa’s race problem. All eight leaders question the Prime Minister’s offer of independence.
The Prime Minister tells black ‘homeland’ leaders that one-man-one-vote in a Parliament for whites and blacks will never come about. Black majority rule in the ‘homelands’ will prevail and the whites will govern South Africa. The six months grace period was not intended ‘to turn South Africa upside-down’.
20 November, The Masters and Servants Act and sections of the Bantu Labour Act are repealed. The repealing Act, the Second General Laws Amendment Act, makes it an offence to cause hostility between sections of the population and prohibits the furnishing of information, without ministerial permission, about business matters in response to any order, direction or request emanating outside the Republic.
Second General Law Amendment Act No 94
(as amended by Acts No 87 of 1977, No 99 of 1978, No 74 of 1982, No 110 of 1983, Nos 84 & 95 of 1986 and No 101 of 1987):
Repealed the Masters and Servants Acts (1856-1910). Section 1 of this Act prohibits any words or acts intended to cause feelings of hostility between different population groups of the Republic. Section 2 prohibits the furnishing of information about business carried on in or outside the Republic to any person outside the Republic without the permission of the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
21 November, An agreement is signed in Blantyre by which South Africa undertakes to lend Malawi R19m. to build a railway line between Lilongwe, the capital, and the Zambian border.
23 November, Thabo Mbeki marries Zanele Dlamini in London.
27 November, In a by-election at Wonderboom (Pretoria) the National Party candidate retains the seat by 5,745 votes against 1,077 cast for the Herstigte Nasionale Party.
5 December, A comprehensive monetary agreement is signed between South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland.
7 December, International Monetary Fund announces the termination of South Africa’s request of the 1969 arrangements for the sale of South African gold.
13 December, South Africa Signs an amendment to the trade agreement of 13 March 1967 with Malawi.
16 December, The General Assembly, in resolution 3324 E (XXIX) recommended that “the South African regime should be totally excluded from participation in all international organisations and conferences under the auspices of the United Nations so long as it continues to practice apartheid and fails to abide by United Nations resolutions concerning Namibia and Southern Rhodesia.“
17 December, A three-day Black Renaissance Convention ended at St. Peter's Seminary, Hammanskraal. It was sponsored by the Christian Institute, the South African Council of Churches, the Roman Catholic Church, IDAMSA, ASSECA etc. It called for Black Solidarity.
In a declaration, it rejected the policy of separate development and all its institutions and all forms of racism.
22 December, The Minister of Foreign Affairs, H. Muller, defines the government’s policy of ending discrimination inside South Africa and of detente in external relations.
The People’s Republic of Angola is born.
1975
The Black Women's Federation is formed. It draws heavily on the Women's Charter.
Lillian Ngoyi’s banning order is renewed for five years.
Ela Gandhi is banned.
Mamphela Ramphele founds Zanempilo Community Health Centre in Zinyoka, outside King William’s Town.
Lindiwe Sisulu is detained. After her release she joins MK and works underground. She undergoes military training and specializes in Intelligence.
The Women's Committee at Crossroads plays a central role in resisting threats of eviction and pass raids.
In the Pretoria Supreme Court, South African Students' Organisation (SASO) and Black People's Convention (BPC) leaders accused of promoting anti-White' feelings, of encouraging racial hostility and preparing for violent revolution, are convicted under the Terrorism Act.
Aged about 12, Robert McBride is taught martial arts by his father. This follows a beating Robert received by a much older boy, in a tough neighbourhood with many gangs. He becomes more aggressive and involved in literally hundreds of fights. Despite this, Robert never joined any gangs, largely because of the discipline of his parents.
Robert and a childhood friend Andre play rugby and do karate training together at a local gym opposite the police station. Their trainer is a Black man named Enoch Blood.
Cape Town-based Hellenic (White) claim the Chevrolet Champion of Champions by defeating Kaizer Chiefs (5-2 on aggregate).
Thabo Mbeki is appointed acting African National Congress representative in Swaziland.
Thabo Mbeki is appointed to the National Executive of the African National Congress.
January - February, A number of measures are taken at government, provincial and municipal level to liberalize the applications of apartheid rules. Attempts to organize sports on a multi-racial basis are, however, blocked by cabinet ministers.
5 January, The British Foreign Minister, llaghan, arrives in Port Elizabeth for a three-hour meeting with Prime Minister VorsJames Cater. Talks focus on the Rhodesian situation and the possibilities for political settlement.
16 January, Congressman Charles C. Diggs, Jr. disclosed that he had been refused a visa to visit South Africa.
22 January, At a meeting between John Vorster and eight ‘homelands’ leaders, strong representations are made to the Prime Minister on the disabilities of Africans in urban areas. The meeting produces some concessions but falls short of African demands.
23 January, At a meeting between the Prime Minister and a liaison committee of the Coloured Representative Council (CRC), important decisions include reaffirmation in principle of parity in salaries for Coloureds and Coloured representation on statutory bodies.
30 January, Dr. Nicolaas Diederichs, Minister of Finance, is elected as the National Party’s candidate to succeed .1.1. Fouché as State President at the end of his term of office on 9 April 1975.
31 January, New Cabinet appointments are announced: Senator Owen P.F. Horwood - Finance; 1. Chris Heunis - Economic Affairs; Si. Marais Steyn – Indian Affairs and Tourism. P.W. Botha, the Minister of Defence, becomes Leader of the Assembly.
February, Differences over the role to be played by the Parliamentary Opposition lead to a spate of expulsions and defections from the United Party.
10 February, It is confirmed by the Department of Foreign Affairs that the Foreign Minister, Dr. H. Muller, visited Lusaka for talks with the foreign ministers of Tanzania, Zambia and Botswana and with leaders of the Rhodesian ANC.
11 February, A Rhodesian government spokesman announces that elements of the South African police were withdrawing from certain forward positions on the Zambezi River, a move made after undertakings from the Zambian government about guerrilla infiltrations there.
A new Reform Party is founded.
A second report by the Commission of Inquiry, under the chairmanship of Justice Van Wyk de Vries, appointed in 1968 to investigate the activities of South Africa’s white universities and the University of South Africa (UNISA) is submitted to Parliament. The report, completed in 1972, recommends that the Minister of Education be empowered to declare any inter-university or student organisation undesirable, if it is engaged in political activities. NUSAS is particularly targeted.
11 February, Prime Minister Vorster visits Liberia for talks with President Tolbert. It is confirmed that the government’s ‘homelands’ policy is explained and discussed.
17 February, The Prime Minister confirms his visit to Liberia and describes the talks as long and fruitful.
18 February, All activities of the South African Students’ Organisation (SASO) are suspended until further notice. The announcement is made at the University of the North at Turfloop, Transvaal.
21 February, Dr Diederichs receives the unanimous vote of the Electoral College, consisting of members of both Houses of Parliament, to become State President
26 February, South Africa Signs trade agreement with Taiwan.
8 March, The Commission for the Programme against Racism of the World Council 8 of Churches (WCC) calls for actions to discourage tourism and visits by churchmen, political figures and sportsmen to South Africa and condemns Prime Minister Vorster’s detente policy.
5 March, A sharp indictment of apartheid is published by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
10 March, All South African policemen in Rhodesia are being confined to camps. South Africa is slowly disengaging from the settlement situation in Rhodesia.
11 March, The Liberian legislature expresses support for President Tolbert’s policy of contact with South Africa.
16 March, Bram Fischer is released from prison, following widespread appeals on his behalf, on health grounds, by the United Nations Secretary-General, Dr Kurt Waldheim, by the British Labour Party and by liberal Members of Parliament, as well as by many prominent South Africans.
17 March, Meetings are held in Cape Town between Prime Ministers Vorster and Ian Smith, with discussions focussing on the détente policy and the future of Rhodesia.
18 March, Herbert Chitepo, 52, ZANU leader, killed in Lusaka when his car blew up in an explosion.
19 March, The second elections to the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council result in thirty-one of the Council’s forty elective seats being won by the anti-apartheid Labour Party, which now has an absolute majority in the Council. Its leader, Sonny Leon, states that his party’s minimum demand is full equality with whites - complete economic and political freedom.
On the day of the elections the Minister of Coloured Relations gives notice of a Bill enabling him to exercise the powers and functions of the Council in certain circumstances.
The first elections of twenty members of the Legislative Assembly take place in Qwaqwa.
25 March, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty for the modification and further extension of the Wheat Trade Convention.
26 March, Senator Owen Horwood announces a 36% rise in proposed defence expenditure, the defence budget being raised to R948, 122,000. The White Paper following the Budget announces plans for an expansion and reorganisation of the Defence Forces.
27 March, The government’s final proposals for the consolidation of the ‘homelands’ are announced. The total number of separate homeland areas will be reduced from 113 to thirty-six.
Minister of Defence P.W. Botha, presents a White Paper outlining defence policy and justifying the increased expenditure which now accounts for one-fifth of the country’s revenue budget.
7 April, The Prime Minister announces that a pilot plant for the manufacture of enriched uranium has gone into production. The overall production cost is expected to be between 25% and 35% lower than that of enrichment methods in other countries.
8 April, The government registers a strong protest after a South African Airways plane is hit by bullets as it lands in Luanda, Angola. Until an investigation is completed, SAA will not use Luanda as a stopover.
9 April, President Fouché ends his seven-year term of office.
10 April, Chief Kaiser Matanzima announces that the government has agreed to assist the Transkei in setting up its own army. Training of recruits will begin within a few months.
12 April, Atlas Corporation completes deliveries to the South African Air Force (SAAF) of a first series of Impala MK-2 jet fighters.
14 April, Despite opposition, the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council Amendment Bill is approved.
19 April, Dr. Nicholaas Diederichs, former Finance Minister, is inaugurated as South Africa’s third State President.
20 April, The names of the nominated members of the Coloured Persons Representative Council are announced. They include four Labour Party members, giving that party a total of thirty-five of the Council’s sixty seats. It is accepted that Sonny Leon will be Chairman of the Council’s Executive Committee.
24 April, Under an amendment to the Defence Act the definition of superior officer is changed with the effect that white and black members of the Defence Force will have equal status.
25 April, The Foreign Minister announces that South Africa will begin recruiting blacks for its diplomatic service in the near future.
29 April, Proclamation No 86:
Provided that the Legislative Assembly could, by petition, request the State President to remove a minister from office and order the appointment of another.
30 April, The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) decides at its seventh Congress in Geneva to suspend South Africa from membership until it renounces racial discrimination.
1 May, The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development announces that the government has decided on far-reaching concessions for urban Africans involving home ownership and trading rights.
6 May, The government announces that its aim is to provide all black children with free and compulsory education as soon as possible.
7 May, Prime Minister Vorster emphasizes the need for continuing his policy of increasing détente in Southern Africa.
8 May, Former advocate Bram Fischer, sentenced to life imprisonment for communist activities, dies in Bloemfontein.
He was transferred from prison to a hospital in Bloemfontein where he was nursed by his brother, Dr Paul Fischer. Only his closest relatives were allowed to visit him.
14 May, Prime Minister Vorster gives the first official confirmation of his two-day meeting with President Houphouet-Boigny in the Ivory Coast on 22-23 September 1974. Discussions focussed on the improvement of relations between African states.
18 May, It is disclosed that John Vorster has invited the Presidents of the Ivory Coast and Liberia to visit South Africa.
20 May, The Foreign Minister, Dr. Muller, confirms that the government will continue to co-operate with Rhodesia, whatever solution is found to the political problems there and that South Africa will not apply economic sanctions.
28 May, In its report submitted to Parliament, the Le Grange (formerly Schlebusch) Commission, declares that certain activities of the Christian Institute of Southern Africa are a danger to the State. The Commissions findings are rejected by the Institute, by other South African churchmen and by the South African Council of Churches (SACC).
30 May, The Minister of Justice announces that the Christian Institute has been declared an affected organisation under the Affected Organisation’s Act of 1974.
June - September, People arrested include lecturers at the Universities of Cape Town and Natal, leaders of NUSAS, an assistant to Dr. Beyers Naudé and the Afrikaans author Breyten Breytenbach. Most are detained under the Terrorism Act.
2 June, Under an amendment to the Suppression of Communism Act, approved without objection, it ceases to be automatically an offence to quote banned persons after their restriction order has been withdrawn, or has lapsed.
5 June, The Cape Supreme Court, sitting in Port Elizabeth, sets aside the 1973 election of Lennox Sebe and three other members of the Ciskei Legislative Assembly on the grounds of irregularities at the capital, Zwelitsha. Lennox Sebe is accordingly ineligible for the office of Chief Minister.
6 June, A proclamation is published in the Government Gazette providing for the detention of offenders for up to three years in rehabilitation centres to be set up in the homelands’. The regulations are strongly attacked in the English press and controversy continues into July 1975.
9 June, The final report of the Le Grange Commission, dealing with the University Christian Movement (UCM), defunct since 1972, is submitted to Parliament. The Commission finds that the UCM, as a multi-racial body, has engaged in dangerous activities aimed at propagating violent resolution
12 June, The Minister of Indian Affairs announces that South African Indians will be free to move from one province to another without prior permission, with the exception of the Orange Free State.
13 June, Robert Sobukwe, former leader of the banned Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC), although still under a banning order, is admitted to practice as an attorney in Kimberley.
16 June, The British Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary, James Callaghan, announces in the House of Commons that the Simonstown Agreement with South Africa has been terminated. There will be no further joint exercises between the Royal and South African navies. The facilities will remain available to countries of the free world wishing to co-operate in the defence of the Cape Sea Route.
The Minister of Economic Affairs. J.C. Heunis, announces that the government has agreed to increase the education and industrial training of Africans in white areas.
17 June, The British Minister of State for Defence says that the ending of the Simonstown Agreements means an end to all the military co-operation between Britain and South Africa associated with them. In South Africa P.W. Botha sees the ending of the agreements as a challenge and the government will continue to improve and develop Simonstown’s facilities.
19 June, Lennox Sebe is appointed general and economic adviser to the Ciskei Cabinet.
South Africa signs multilateral treaty on the civil liability for oil pollution damage.
25 June, Mozambican Independence is obtained under the leadership of Frelimo.
6 July, It is reported that Israel and South Africa are increasing their cooperation and contacts in the military sphere, and negotiating joint economic ventures, including the construction of a major new railway in Israel, and the building of a desalination plant in South Africa.
23 July, The South African Council of Churches (SACC) warns the government that unless the country’s racial policies are reversed it will not be possible to achieve peace.
Signs multilateral treaty with GATT on the extension of the provisional accession of Colombia.
25 July, Congresses of both the Progressive and the Reform parties, held simultaneously in Johannesburg, unanimously approve the merger of the two parties under the name of South African Progressive Reform Party (PRP). The new party’s leader is Cohn Eghin. It has eleven seats in the 171-member House of Assembly.
1 August, An order has been issued withdrawing the remaining South African Police from Rhodesia.
6 August, In a by-election in Caledon, Cape Province, the National Party makes substantial gains at the expense of the United Party.
8 August, Signs single treaty on narcotic drugs, 1961, as amended by the Protocol of 25 March 1972.
9 August, Moses Kotane is awarded the Isithwalandwe Seaparankoe.
French government has decided to supply no further continental (ground or air) armaments to South Africa. This political decision does not affect naval armaments or existing contracts.
11 August, Decisions on the future constitution of the Transkei are agreed upon at a meeting of a Cabinet committee of the South African and Transkei governments, presided over by John Vorster in Pretoria.
12 August, A statement issued simultaneously is Lusaka and Salisbury, gives details of proposals agreed to after two days of talks between John Vorster and Ian Smith, which could lead to a settlement of the Rhodesian constitutional problem.
13 August, During a visit to Paraguay by the Prime Minister, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, four agreements on South African aid to Paraguay are signed in Asuncion.
19 August, A number of new arrests are made under the Terrorism Act.
22 August, Prime Minister Vorster officially opens the Orange-Fish River Tunnel, believed to be the world’s longest continuous tunnel (c.50 mhes), constructed at a cost of 76,400,000 Pounds Sterling.
 South Africa signs a treaty with Swaziland on the establishment of an office for the Swaziland government labour representative in South Africa.
25 August, Meeting of Prime Minister Vorster and President Kaunda at Victoria Falls.
11 September, At the invitation of Dr. Connie Mulder, the Ivory Coast’s Minister of Information, M.L. Dona-Fologo, visits South Africa on a fact finding tour. It is described as the first visit to South Africa by a West African minister.
12 September, The Coloured Persons Representative Council (CRC) adjourns without passing its budget and urges the government to meet its demands for Parliamentary representation and full rights as citizens.
Signs commercial agreement with Greece on air services.
16 September, South Africa fails to return for the 30th Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Its relations with the United Nations are said to be under review.
19 September, While officially opening the Biennial Congress of the Coordinating Council of South African Trade Unions in Pretoria, the Minister of Labour announces government plans to establish black industrial committees which will have direct bargaining powers with employers.
26 September, The Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU) condemns the South African government’s plan for black works councils.
30 September, Winnie Mandela is released from her banning order and house arrest.
2 October, Chief Kaiser Matanzima announces in Umtata that the Transkei will become fully independent on 26 October 1976.
5 October, Winnie Mandela ends thirteen years of enforced silence with a strong attack on the country’s Terrorism Act.
20 October, The Prime Minister holds discussions on constitutional developments with the chairman and other members of the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council, and makes various proposals. These are rejected and an immediate referendum among white voters on the issue of full citizen rights for Coloured people is called for.
27 October, South Africa Signs an amendment to a customs union agreement of 11 September 1969 with Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland.
4 November, Lennox Sebe again becomes Chief Minister of the Ciskei, having won a by-election on 24 October 1975.
Castro decides to send troops to Angola to fight South Africans
11 November, State President, Dr. N. Diederichs, summarily dismisses Sonny Leon as Executive Chairman of the Coloured people’s Representative Council (CPRC), following his refusal to sign a government-approved budget for the Coloured community and his total rejection of apartheid and its laws.
Angola become independant from Portugual
12 November, Four other members of the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council resign. This is seen as the first step in the destruction of the CPRC.
18 November, South Africa signs multilateral treaty on the extension of the International Sugar Agreement, 1973.
General Assembly adopted resolution 3411 C (XXX) proclaiming “that the United Nations and the international community have a special responsibility towards the oppressed people of South Africa and their liberation movements, and towards those imprisoned, restricted or exiled for their struggle against apartheid.
19 November, Chief Lucas Mangope of the Bophuthatswana homeland, receives a mandate from his Democratic Party to begin negotiations for the independence of that territory.
20 November, The Bophuthatswana Legislative Assembly concludes a two-day Special Session during which it formally votes to open negotiations with South Africa for independence.
23 November, A newly formed extreme right-wing organisation, the Afrikaner Resistance Movement, is being investigated by the authorities.
26 November, The Afrikaans writer Breyten Breytenbach is sentenced in the Pretoria Supreme Court to nine years imprisonment for offences under the Terrorism Act. He has pleaded guilty to entering South Africa to start an organisation, Atlas or Okhela, intended to be the white wing of the ANC.
27 November, At a meeting in Durban, between S. Leon and several Indian and African leaders, a call is made for the formation of an alliance of black and brown people. It receives some support but is opposed by the Federal Party.
5 December, KwaZulu: Public Services Act No 7:
12 December, The Christian Institute appeals to the Prime Minister, John Vorster, asking him to reconsider the withdrawal or confiscation of the passport of six of their leaders, including that of Dr. Beyers Naude.
15 December, South Africa Signs a visa agreement with Uruguay.
16 December, The United Nations General Assembly approves a series of resolutions demanding sanctions against South Africa.
18 December, South Africa Signs multilateral customs agreement on the temporary importation of pedagogic material.
South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on customs - the ATA Carnet for the temporary admission of goods with annex.
1976
South African Army defeated by Angolan People’s Army.
Many Soweto student leaders were influenced by the ideas of black consciousness. The South African Students Movement (SASM), one of the first organisations of black high school students, played an important role in the 1976 uprising. There were also small groups of student activists who were linked to old ANC members and the ANC underground. ANC underground structures issued pamphlets calling on the community to support students and linking the student struggle to the struggle for national liberation.
Fietas Johannesburg, Major removals in Pageview begin.
The Department of Community Development lists 4988 housing units administered by itself in Lenasia.
Inter-Cabinet Council formed by the Prime Minister with members drawn from the Coloured Persons Council and the Indian Council and the white cabinet. First meeting boycotted by the Coloured Labour Party (Dugard 1978: 101).
Bantu Administration Amendment Act No 2:
This Act was similar to the 1927 Black Administration Act [SA], with a few amendments.
Population Registration Act No 24:
Provided for census and citizenship rights in Transkei and for the compilation of a population register.
Citizenship of Transkei Act No 26:
Set out requirements for citizenship.
Tennyson Makiwane, Alfred Kgokong and other “African Nationalists“ expelled from ANC.
According to the government-appointed Cillie Commission of Enquiry 575 people died. Police action resulted in 451 deaths.
3 907 people were injured. The police were responsible for 2 389 injuries.
Both the death and inquiry figures were disputed by various sources as being too low.
5 980 were arrested for offences related to the resistance in the townships.
Within four months of the Soweto revolt 160 African communities all over the country were involved in resistance. It was estimated that at least 250 000 people in Soweto were actively involved in the resistance. Resistance in the various communities were located in all four provinces and the homelands.
A police witness said to the Cillie Commission that at least 46 incidents of arson, strikes and disturbances occurred in Venda, Lebowa and Gazankulu.
The Internal Security Amendment Act replaced the Suppression of Communism Act. The new act enhanced the powers of the Minister of Justice and included the declaration of unlawful organisations, prohibition of publications, prohibition of attendance at gatherings, the restriction of persons to certain areas, detention of persons in custody and witnesses.
Large numbers of students left the country and went into exile.
South African troops invaded Angola in support of the Unita and FNLA alliance. They penetrated up to 900 km into Angola.
Thandi Modise, student in Soweto, is jailed for ten years.
Mamphela Ramphele detained under Section 10 of Terrorism Act.
Winnie Mandela establishes the Black Women’s Federation and Black Parents’ Association during the Soweto uprisings. She is detained under the Internal Security Act.
Fatima Meer’s home is petrol bombed.
Gill Marcus, becomes editor of the ANC’s weekly bulletin
Phyllis’ banning order ends
Phyllis sets up her own practice and defends Harry Gwala and others. She also helps those released from Robben Island to find jobs.
With Shadrack Maphumulo, Phyllis establishes a new escape route to Swaziland, after the kidnapping of Joseph Nduli and Cleopas Ndlovu.
Robert McBride, aged 13, is arrested while challenging the beating by police of a youth in their charge office.
South Africa is formally expelled from FIFA. The Football Council of South Africa is formed, chaired by George Thabe.
Thabo Mbeki together with Jacob Zuma and Albert Dlhomo are placed under protective custody by the Swazi authorities. This is because of the growing threat from the South African authorities wanting to capture the three ANC officials.
1 January, The Centre against Apartheid was established in the United Nations Secretariat, with E. S. Reddy, Chief of Section for African Affairs, as director.
5 January, A full-scale television service is officially opened by the Prime Minister. He issues a warning against slanted news and unbalanced presentations.
The Meadowlands Tswana School Board meets with the local inspector of the Bantu Education Department to discuss the conflict that has been escalating in Soweto schools since the beginning of the school year.
22 January, A government reshuffle, including the appointment of three new ministers and two new deputy ministers is announced on the eve of the opening of the 1976 Parliamentary session. The most significant change is the appointment of Dr. Andries Treurnicht, the conservative former chairman of the Afrikaner Broederbond, as Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration and Bantu Education.
27 January, South Africa signs a treaty with Uruguay on the exchange of postal parcels.
30 January, A Parliamentary Internal Security Bill provides for the establishment of a Commission of ten members of Parliament, to investigate internal security matters, in secret, referred to it by the State President and drastic penalties will be imposed on those refusing to testify before it. Its reports will have to be submitted to Parliament, although all or part of them can be kept gar secret, if it is ‘not in the public interest’ to disclose their contents. It is strongly opposed by the Progressive Reform Party and the Herstigte Nasionale Party. The United Party refuses to sit on the Commission.
2 February, South Africa signs second additional treaty to the constitution of the Universal Postal Union of 10 July 1964.
5 February, The Defence Amendment Bill, making provision for the employment of South African conscripted troops anywhere outside South Africa, is approved. The Defence Force may now, at all times, be deployed to prevent or suppress any armed conflict outside the Republic which is, or may be, a threat to the Republic.
7 February, The Minister of Justice announces that apartheid laws will be done away with in sixteen hotels, allowing them to cater for all races. International status will be granted as from 16 February 1976.
12 February, The report of the Snyman Commission into the disturbances on the campus of the University of the North at Turfloop, finds that the South African Students Organisation (SASO) was responsible for the unrest at Turfloop and other black campuses, and was aimed at overthrowing the political system in South Africa.
24 February, The first indications of protest over schooling in Afrikaans appears in Soweto schools.
4 March, In the House of Assembly, the Prime Minister criticizes Mozambique’s action of closing its border with Rhodesia. He warns of the dangers inherent in the situation and of the aggravating factor presented by the Russian and Cuban involvements in Southern Africa.
The Black People's Convention, the South African Students Organisation and the South African Students Movement become active in Soweto schools over the issue of schooling in Afrikaans
12 March, It is announced that all South African troops have been withdrawn from Angola except those guarding the Cunene River hydro-electric projects.
14 March, Chief Gatsha Buthelezi makes a major policy statement in Soweto, before an audience of 10,000 people, denouncing the government’s homelands policy and indicating that the country must move towards majority rule. He calls for a series of black national conventions to discuss foreign investments, homelands independence and foreign policy, particularly détente with black Africa.
20 March, The Roman Catholic Church decides in principle to open its 192 all-white schools to black pupils. Legal questions relating to this will be discussed with the government.
22 March, The Minister of Information and the Interior, Dr. Connie Mulder, pays a three-day official visit to the Ivory Coast. Talks are held on Communist penetration in Africa.
27 March, Remaining troops are withdrawn from the Angolan border after the MPLA government has undertaken through Soviet and British good offices, and the mediation of the United Nations Secretary-General to respect the border, and assure the safety of the project and their personnel.
29 March, Opposition amendments to the Parliamentary Internal Security Commission Bill are defeated in the House of Assembly, where it is given its third reading. The Prime Minister declares that the government believes Parliament, and not the courts, should combat subversion.
31 March, In the 1976-77 budget, defence expenditure is raised to R1,350 m, or 17.2 percent of the total expenditure.
5 April, South Africa signs multilateral treaty modifying and further extending the Wheat Trade Convention, 1971.
9 April, Prime Minister Vorster, accompanied by his Foreign Minister Dr. Muller, visits Israel. A joint Ministerial Committee will meet at least once a year to review economic relations and to discuss, inter alia, scientific and industrial cooperation.
19 April, Baleka Kgositsile goes into exile and works for the ANC in Swaziland.
23 April, A draft constitution for the Transkei is published in Umtata.
27 April, South Africa’s diplomatic representation in Taiwan has been raised from Consulate-General to full ambassadorial level.
30 April, Pupils at Orlando West Junior School go on strike against the use of Afrikaans in education.
May, Thabo Mbeki is asked to leave Swaziland because pressure is mounting on the Swazi Government from the South Africa Government to have Thabo arrested.
2 May, Signs treaty with Israel amending the extradition treaty.
3 May, The Parliamentary Internal Security Commission Bill, providing for the establishment of a commission of members of the House of Assembly to investigate internal security matters, is approved in the Senate, and enacted shortly afterwards.
5 May, In the Parliamentary by-election in Durban North, the Progresive Reform Party’s candidate gains the party’s first seat in Natal, bringing the PRP’s representation in the House of Assembly to twelve. The United Party suffers a serious defeat.
12 May, A female teacher is attacked by two robbers on her way to school and is saved by more than 100 pupils from Orlando North Secondary School, who catch the robbers and beat them to death. In another incident in May, a pupil stabs a teacher at Pimville. Police try to arrest the pupils but are stoned by other pupils.
16 May, James Ranisi Jolobe, Xhosa author and poet, and Presbyterian clergyman, dies in Tsolo, Transkei
Pupils at Phefeni Secondary School start boycotting classes in protest against the use of Afrikaans in education. The unrest spreads to Belle Higher Primary School, Thulasizwe Higher Primary School, and Emthonjeni Khulo Ngolawazi Higher Primary School.
17 May, Pupils at Orlando West Junior School strike in protest at the dismissal of a member of the school board. They bombard the principal's office with stones and draw up a memorandum of grievances, which they hand to the principal.
21 May, Parliamentary Internal Security Commission Act No 67:
Established a parliamentary Internal Security Commission and set out its functions. It differed little from the USA House Committee on Un-American Activities except that the South African law had more sanctions at its disposal (Dugard 1978: 173).
Repealed by 7 of the Abolition of Restriction on Free Political Activity Act No 206 of 1993.
24 May, Pupils reject a call by the Orlando Diepkloof School board to return to school. The strike spreads to Pimville Higher Primary School. The SA Students Movements makes an attempt to consolidate the situation and holds a conference in Roodepoort to discusses the campaign against the use of Afrikaans as a medium of instruction.
29 May, The South African Electricity Supply Commission (ESCOM) announces in Pretoria that it has decided to order two nuclear power stations from France.
8 June, Security police arrive at Naledi High School and attempt to arrest the leader of the local branch of the SA Students Movement. Pupils stone the police and bum their car.
10 June, The Internal Security Bill is enacted. Originally published on 4 May 1976, as the Promotion of State Security Bill, it is designed to amend and widen the scope of the 1950 Suppression of Communism Act. It is strongly condemned by the opposition and by the legal profession.
11 June, The recently appointed deputy minister of “bantu education“, Andries Treumicht, rejects the applications by five Soweto schools to depart from the so-called 50-50 policy in secondary education, which entailed equal use of English and Afrikaans in schooling.
13 June, Sisulu's daughter Lindiwe detained.
The Naledi branch of the SA Students Movement holds a meeting, attended by representatives of all Soweto schools, at which it is decided that protests will be held on June 16 against the use of Afrikaans in education.
An action committee called the Soweto Students' Representative Council is formed to organise the demonstration, with two representatives from each school.
16 June, Student anger and grievances against Bantu education exploded in Soweto. Tens of thousands of high school students took to the streets to protest against compulsory use of Afrikaans at schools. Police opened fire on marching students, killing thirteen-year old Hector Pieterson and at least three others. This began an uprising that spread to other parts of the country leaving over 1,000 dead, most of whom were killed by the police.
Demonstrations by secondary school pupils, protesting against the compulsory use of the Afrikaans language as a medium of instruction,’ escalate into an outbreak of violence in Soweto, during which police open fire on the protesters. Casualties occur, the first being Hector Petersen. Rioting, arson, looting and lawlessness spread.
During these days, rioting, arson, destruction and protest spread to other localities and townships, mainly in the Transvaal, but reaching Natal as well as several black ‘homelands’.
The Soweto Uprisings begin with about 20 000 students marching in protest to the new language decree and the Bantu Education system. The march turned out violently with many students being killed by the police. The uprising spreads countrywide, and it is believed that Black Consciousness contributed significantly to the ferment behind the uprising.
Internal Security Amendment Act No 79:
Removed the requirement that internment be linked with states of emergency. It amended five other Security Acts and embodied the 1967 Suppression of Communism Act with some amendments. The ‘Sobukwe’ clause for indefinite detention was deleted and a new provision for indefinite preventive detention was created instead. A Review Committee was established to review detentions within two months and could recommend further detention. Prohibition of bail and detention of potential witnesses were provided for. Restrictions on movement of banned persons were included.
Repealed by the Internal Security Act No 74 of 1982 and the Internal Security and Intimidation Amendment Act No 138 of 1991 except for s 10. Section 10 was repealed by the State of Emergency Act No 86 of 1995.
17 June, Parliament meets in an Extraordinary Session at the request of the leader of the Opposition, Cohn Eglin. The resignation of the Minister of Bantu Affairs is called for, and that of his conservative Deputy, Andries Treurnicht.
The Minister of Justice and Police, J.T. Kruger, announces his decision to appoint a one-man judicial commission in the person of Justice P.M. Cihhié, Judge-President of the Transvaal, to investigate the disturbances in Soweto.
The Status of the Transkei Bill passes its second reading in the Senate, despite opposition from the United Party and the Progressive Reform Party.
17 June, The second day of the protest is marked by uncontrollable fury. Fires rage in townships throughout the country. Pupils stone cars passing through Soweto. Police shoot at random, and at anyone who raises a fist and shouts “power“. Helicopters fly overhead. Workers refuse to go to work.
18 June, The report of the Commission, under the chairmanship of Professor Erika Theron, to investigate matters relating to the Coloured community in South Africa, is submitted to the House of Assembly. The Commission makes 178 recommendations, approved by majority vote, the most important of which the government subsequently rejects, i.e. that political rights be restored to Coloured people in Parliament.
The United Nations Security Council is called into session at the urgent request of the African states. It issues a unanimous condemnation of South Africa for resorting to massive violence against demonstrators opposing racial discrimination.
The number of skirmishes between pupils and police diminishes. A general stayaway is organised. There are reports of pupils seizing weapons from the police and using them to shoot back at the police.
19 June, The Government Gazette announces that 123 persons have been banned as a result of the June 16 revolt. The minister of police imposes a nationwide prohibition on the holding of meetings, which was later extended to the end of the year.
23 June, Prime Minister Vorster holds talks with the United States Secretary of State, Dr. Kissinger, in West Germany.
24 June, The Principal’s office in Hlangisi Primary (Nyanga) was burnt out and the following day the same riot squad threatened officials at the Bantu administration.
25 June, Acting Prime Minister P.W. Botha, says in the House of Assembly that the government has no objection to 158 of the 178 recommendations in the Theron Report. but that there is no prospect of a qualified franchise, a return to the common voters’ roll or direct representation of Coloureds in Parliament. Nor will the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act be repealed.
The death toll in the riots is officially given as 174 blacks and two whites, the number of wounded 1,222 blacks and six whites, the number of persons arrested 1,298. Property damaged or destroyed is officially listed as sixty-seven state owned beer halls and bottle stores, fifty-three administration buildings, thirteen schools, eight state hostels, 154 vehicles, as well as banks. clinics, bus sheds, hostels and factories - public buildings and amenities built up over the previous twenty-five years.
27 June, The National President of the Black People’s Convention declares that riots have ushered in a new era of political consciousness.
Further arson occurs on Langa Post Office and Zimosa school.
July, The Minister of Police impose a nationwide prohibition of meetings, which is renewed until the end of the year.
6 July, The government announces that teaching in Afrikaans in black schools will no longer be compulsory.
The South African Government annulled the regulation that African pupils be instructed equally in English and Afrikaans, and issued new regulations leaving the choice of the medium of instruction to school principals, subject to approval by the Government.
15 July, The Minister of Justice, JT. Kruger, announces that the provisions of the Internal Security Act, allowing for the unlimited detention without trial of persons deemed to be threatening public order, will apply in the Transvaal Province with immediate effect for one year. All public gatherings are banned and schools in Soweto and other riot areas will remain closed.
18 July, The International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid came into force.
19 July, Extension of the Application of Transkeian Laws Act No 6:
Attempted to define areas of function for Transkeian laws.
20 July, In more than seventy townships, a further series of disturbances occur, leading to considerable destruction of property and loss of life. These riots are apparently now organized by militant youths, demanding change and liberation.
21 July, The closure of schools in black townships is rescinded by the Minister for Police, justice and Prisons.
30 July, The Opposition press strongly attacks the detention of four journalists under the Terrorism Act.
Emil Solomon "Solly" Sachs, South African socialist, dies in London
August, The police begin arresting black leaders, not only members of the Black Peoples Convention (BPC) and the South African Students’ Organisation (SASO), but also members of the Soweto Black Parents’ Organisation.
The government’s policies are repeatedly and strongly criticized by prominent churchmen.
Widespread arrests of black leaders and dissidents, office-bearers, priests, teachers and doctors follow a speech to the National Party Congress in Durban by Justice Minister Kruger, in which he claims that black power will have to be destroyed if race riots are not to become endemic. All the main black opposition groups are affected.
2 August, French officials disclose that France is to supply South Africa with two destroyer escorts.
UWC students convene a meeting to express solidarity with the students of Soweto and decide to embark on a boycott of classes.
4 August, Riots erupt again in Soweto and spread to other townships in South Africa. The Minister of Justice again bans public meetings under the Riotous Assemblies Act, until the end of August.
5 August, Mapetla Mohapi dies in detention, police claim that he hung himself with a pair of jeans.
6 August, The Hewat Training College in Athlone is set alight in solidarity with the UWC boycotters.
7 August, A new deal for urban blacks is announced in Pretoria by the Minister of Bantu Administration and by the Minister of Justice and Police.
8 August, Fire destroys Struis Bay school Principal’s office.
9 August, The Theron Commission Report is discussed at a meeting between the Prime Minister and the sixteen-member Liaison Committee of the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council (CPRC).
Violence again erupts in the black townships. The Prime Minister says he does not regard the present combination of external and internal pressures on South Africa as critical.
10 August, The government extends its powers under the Internal Security Act from the Transvaal only to the whole of South Africa.
Part of a prefabricated building of the Peninsula College for Advanced Technical Education is gutted and three explosives are found at Goodhope Primary in Bellville South.
11 August, Violence spreads to Cape Town,to the black townships of Langa, Nyanga and Guguletu and then, for the first time, to Coloured townships.
African pupils from Langa, Gugulethu and Nyanga hold marches in solidarity with the Soweto students. The Langa students march with placards through their township streets accompanied by their teachers who are determined to keep order. Students are also under police surveillance and 33 people are shot dead in looting related incidents. The police stop the Gugulethu events and students are told to disperse in 8 minutes. The students stand their ground and are eventually showered with tear gas. 25 – 30 people are arrested. The determined crowd goes on to successfully demand the release of the detainees from the Gugulethu police station.
A number of student leaders at the University of the Western Cape and other community leaders are arrested and detained at Victor Verster prison, near Paarl
12 August, This day saw R2 million worth of damage in 36 hours of fighting. Langa and Gugulethu residents stop employees leaving for work. Young children request donations of petrol from cars to make petrol bombs. Students at the Esselen Park High School in Worcester demonstrate in front of the school and are tear-gassed and baton charged.
UCT students march towards the city centre giving the Black Power Salute to black people passing until the police stop them. 73 students were arrested.
In Bellville, 600 coloured students march from the Bellville Training College and clash with police whilst in UWC a poster parade is broken by police. Poster bearers are arrested because of messages such as: “Sorry Soweto, Kruger is a pig; the revolution is coming.”
13 August, The government fully supports the United States initiative for a peaceful settlement of the Rhodesian crisis.
14 August, There are reports of arson in the African townships.
16 August, At the 5th Conference of Non-Aligned Nations in Colombo, Sri Lanka, a resolution is adopted calling for an oil embargo on France and Israel because of their arms sales to South Africa.
Pupils at Alexander Sinton High and Belgravia High boycott classes. 500 UWC students march to the Bellville Magistrate’s Court were 15 students appeared on a number of charges arising from the recent events. There is a fire in Arcadia High and classes were boycotted at Somerset West after permission to hold prayer in sympathy with ‘Blacks who have died’.
20 August, At a Nordic Council meeting in Copenhagen, the Foreign Ministers of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden recommend an international weapons embargo against South Africa.
Sends notification of approval of recommendations relating to the objectives of the Antarctic treaty. of 1 December 1959.
Lebowa: Criminal Procedure Amendment Act No 11
21 August, The leaders of seven of the country’s nine black homelands i.e. all except Chiefs Matanzima (Transkei) and Mangope (Bophuthatswana) meet in Johannesburg to review the political situation and issue a joint statement of appeals, demands and recommendations.
A three-day strike is observed in Soweto by between 150,000 and 200,000 workers.
23 August, An Athlone High school student statement is made condemning police brutality, inferior education, segregation laws and the plight of the detainees. The police change tactics and start going into schools to seek confrontation and to break the youths’ spirit.
24 August, Violent ethnic clashes between Zulus and others, involving circa 10,000 blacks in running fights cause chaos in Soweto which the police appear unable to control. Police collusion is alleged.
29 August, Speaking at a ceremony to mark his tenth anniversary as Prime Minister, John Vorster admits that the country has problems, internationally and economically, but claims that these do not constitute a crisis. His remarks are strongly criticized by the opposition.
30 August, About 600 students from five secondary schools march to Bontheuwel. On their way they are confronted by four riot squad vans. The students are peppered with tear gas and hide in a nearby house. The police flushed the backyard with tear gas to prevent exit.
September, Government ministers repeatedly declare that there is no crisis, and that whatever concessions may be made to meet the demands of the blacks, the policy of separate development will be continued.
Unrest, disturbances and riots spread to Cape Town itself, with interaction with the police on 1, 2 and 7-8, 10-13 September. Sporadic outbreaks of violence continue to occur in Soweto and in central Johannesburg.
1 September, About 2 000 Langa, Nyanga and Gugulethu students march without notice or publicity through the Cape Town CBD unhindered.
2 September, The ban on public gatherings throughout the country is reimposed until 31 October 1976.
The coloured students march to the city in the hope that they will also display a peaceful march. The police were prepared and close down the CBD. The tear gas they spray on students affects all working people there, who later are forced into the chaotic streets by the smell. The city marches continue to September 3 when police execute similar action as the previous day. It appears that the Cape Town revolt has passed the point were intimidation can force youth off the street.
3 September, Prime Minister Vorster flies to Zurich for talks with the United States Secretary of State, Dr. Henry Kissinger. The focus is on the conditions necessary for negotiations on independence for Namibia and for majority rule in Rhodesia.
The Convention on the International Maritime Satellite Organisation, plus Operating Agreement, is adopted in London.
4 September, The youth come out in the coloured townships. Schools, libraries and a magistrates court are set alight.
10 September, The President of the Senate, Marais Viljoen, opening the 1976 Session of the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council announces a number of government decisions aimed at removing obsolete practices and usages causing dissatisfaction among Coloured people.
13 September, The Cillié Commission of Inquiry into the riots in Soweto on 16 June 1976 holds its first public hearing in Johannesburg. Evidence is taken on the extent of the damage and of casualties.
Speaking to the Transvaal Congress of the ruling National Party in Pretoria, the Prime Minister again rejects major changes in the country’s race policies.
A second strike call in Soweto leads to absenteeism estimated at 75-80 per cent in Johannesburg.
14 September, Security Police continue to arrest prominent members of the Coloured community. Several black journalists who covered the Soweto riots are also detained.
15 September, Some 200,000 Coloured workers stay away from work in the Cape Town area. The extent of the strike is unexpected and unprecedented.
17 September, A total of sixty-five documents concerning the establishment of an independent Transkei are signed in Pretoria by the Prime Minister and Chief Kaiser Matanzima. Among them is a non-aggression pact, designed to come into force at independence on 26 October 1976.
20 September, A seven-man delegation of Coloured leaders flies from Cape Town to Pretoria to meet the Prime Minister for discussions on the future of the Coloured community. They appeal to John Vorster for the immediate release of the Chairman of the Coloured Labour Party, the Rev. Allan Hendrickse, unsuccessfully.
23 September, Renewed rioting breaks out in Johannesburg. The Minister of Information, Dr. Connie Mulder, warns of tougher measures, including the use of the army, to deal with the unrest. Four more black journalists are detained, bringing the total number of journalists held to thirteen, eleven of whom are black.
24 September, A crucial meeting of the Coloured Cabinet Council is boycotted by the Labour Party.
29 September, In the Cape Town Supreme Court a British journalist, David Rabkin, his wife and a university lecturer, Jeremy Cronin, are sentenced to ten, one, and seven years’ imprisonment respectively for offences under the Terrorism and Internal Security Acts to which they have pleaded guilty. They have advocated violence leading to insurrection. Since Mrs. Rabkin was expecting a baby, the court suspended eleven months of her twelve-month sentence and she returns to Britain with her new born daughter in October.
General elections are held in the Transkei.
Voters go to the polls in the Transkeis pre-independence elections. The results are a foregone conclusion following the Transkei government’s detention of eight leading opposition Democratic Party officers in July and August.
1 October, France confirms that it is selling two new combat submarines to South Africa, to help it protect the oil route round the Cape in the face of the Soviet naval escalation in the Indian Ocean.
5 October, The elected leaders in the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council reject the government s emergency mini-budget and demand the summoning of an all-race National Convention to consider the country’s future.
8 October, At a seven-hour meeting with eight of the black ‘homeland’ leaders (i.e. all except Chief Matanzima, Transkei) Prime Minister Vorster declares there is no merit at all in the idea of holding a round table conference to plan a new constitution.
A meeting is held between John Vorster and eight ‘homeland’ leaders to discuss the unrest which has left at least three-hundred-and-forty dead, around two-thousand injured and hundreds under arrest. He rejects their demands for a multi-racial constitution and the release of black leaders in detention, This failure precipitates a move towards a common political front between traditional leaders and radical black students to fight for freedom.
15 October, The results of the Transkei general elections are announced. The ruling Transkei National Independence Party (TNIP) win sixty-nine of the seventy-five election seats in the new National Assembly.
17 October, The township of Soweto flares into violence again. An estimated 75,000 Pounds Sterling damage is caused. Incidents are also reported from Cape Town, Pretoria and Krugersdorp.
20 October, Republic of Transkei Constitution Act No 15:
Created a Transkei Constitution.
21 October, The Minister of Justice J. Kruger says that 697 people are being held for security reasons: 123 under the Internal Security Act; 217 under the Terrorism Act; thirty-four are jailed for their protection as witnesses; 323 are held for cases pending in relation to public security.
22 October, Teachers and pupils are arrested at the Morris lsaacson High School in Soweto.
24 October, Further trouble erupts at a funeral in Soweto when a crowd of 4,000 attacks police. Retaliatory fire causes deaths and injuries.
The authorities release the leader of the Coloured Labour Party, the Rev. Allan Hendrickse after holding him in prison for two months.
25 October, Transkei is declared an independent state at midnight. South Africa formally divests itself of all sovereignty over Transkei. The new flag is raised and a 101 gun salute ushers in the new ‘state’.
26 October, At its opening session the Transkei National Assembly elects Paramount Chief B.J. Sigcau as the Transkei’s first President.
South Africa proclaimed the “independence“ of one of the bantustans, the Transkei. On the same day the General Assembly rejected the declaration of independence as invalid, and called upon all governments to deny any form of recognition to Transkei or other bantustans.
Transkei becomes the first independent homeland.
November, Splits appear within the National Party between the ‘verligte’ (enlightened) academics, businessmen and MPs and the ‘verkrampte’ (conservatives) led by Dr. Andries Treurnicht.
November, End November:The inaugural conference of the Black Unity Front is held in Johannesburg. Formed after the abortive meeting between John Vorster and ‘homeland’ leaders on 8 October 1976, its aim is to group middle-class blacks into a moderate anti-apartheid system guided by a steering committee of urban blacks.
1 November, A five-day strike called by militant students in the Soweto Students’ Representative Council (SSRC) meets with only limited response.
6 November, The General Assembly adopted a comprehensive “programme of action against apartheid“ by Governments; specialised agencies and other intergovernmental organisations; and trade unions, churches, anti-apartheid and solidarity movements and other non-governmental organisations.
It established an Ad Hoc Committee to prepare a declaration on apartheid in sports and an international convention against apartheid in sports.
8 November, Signs multilateral treaty, extending the International Sugar Agreement, 1973.
9 November, The General Assembly adopted a comprehensive “programme of action against apartheid“ by Governments, specialised agencies and other intergovernmental organisations, as well as trade unions, churches, anti-apartheid and solidarity movements and other non-governmental organisations.
It established an Ad Hoc Committee to prepare a declaration on apartheid in sports and an international convention against apartheid in sports.
11 November, The United Nations General Assembly adopts nine resolutions against apartheid at the end of a two-and-a-half week debate on the South African question.
1976 - 1979
15 November - 15 June, 110 bombings by insurgents occurred.
16 November, President Perez of Venezuela announces in New York that he has ordered the severance of commercial relations with South Africa.
17 November, Leaders of the three opposition parties meet in an attempt to form a united opposition front. Fundamental principles are laid down by Cohn Eglin, leader of the Progressive Reform Party (PRP). Chairman of the Steering Committee, former Transvaal Judge, K. Marais. presents a detailed draft constitution based on a federal structure.
18 November, The Cillié Commission into recent riots is given a detailed account of the loss of life and damage to property in the Greater Cape Town area.
19 November, Fourteen officials representing non-registered multiracial trade unions are reported to have been served with banning orders. Two main bodies are targeted: the Johannesburg based Urban Training Programme (UTP) and the Co-ordinating Council (TUACC) with a membership of more than 60,000.
23 November, Eight more banning orders are served, mostly on white students connected with black labour organisations.
24 November, School pupils and students from Soweto who have fled to Botswana, Swaziland and Lesotho to escape continuous Security Police searches for ringleaders of unrest, have rejected the government’s amnesty offer which expired on 22 November 1976. An estimated 700 have fled since June, more than 500 of them to Botswana, whose government has requested international assistance in the matter.
27 November, The arrest of five people, detained under the Terrorism Act, coincides with the Security Police search of the Johannesburg headquarters of the Christian Institute and the South African Council of Churches.
30 November, 700 people are in detention.
December, Both the United Party and the Progressive Reform Party formally approve the Marais Committee’s proposals as a basis for a constitution.
Serious fighting and rioting break out in the Cape Town townships of Guguletu, Nyanga and Langa, peak periods being the first week and Christmas weekend. Youths and migrant workers clash; deaths, destruction and arrests follow.
December, The accused South African Students' Organisation (SASO) and Black People's Convention (BPC) leaders of the September 1974, “Viva Frelimo“ rallies are sentenced to terms on Robben Island.
December, Thabo Mbeki is appointed Chief representative of the African National Congress in Nigeria.
2 December, At the end of an eight-month trial a University lecturer, Eddie Webster and four white students are acquitted of all charges against them under the Suppression of Communism and Unlawful Organisations Act.
3 December, QwaQwa: Education Act No 4
15 December, The South African Institute of Race Relations reports that 433 people are known to be still in custody. According to their sources, these comprise fifty-six school children, seventy-two university students, twenty-six student leaders and office-bearers of the South African Students’ Organisation and related organisations, twenty-five members of other Black Consciousness organisations, sixteen churchmen, thirty-five teachers and lecturers, fifteen journalists, sixty state witnesses, six trade unionists, thirteen former political prisoners, one member of the Coloured Labour Party and eighty-one who have no known connection with political organisations. Of this total, 102 were in preventative detention, with no charges pending. In addition, according to the SAIRR, 144 people are under banning orders, restricting their movements and prohibiting them from attending gatherings.
16 December, Calls for judicial inquiries into the death of detainees in police custody are made by the South African Institute of Race Relations, backed by Cohn Eghin, leader of the Progressive Reform Party (PRP) and by Sonny Leon, leader of the Coloured community, who addresses his request to the International Commission of jurists in Geneva.
17 December, The government confirms that guerrillas are being trained for operations in South Africa from bases in Botswana and Mozambique. Minister of Justice Kruger names three South African exiles in London as the men behind the campaign: Joe Slovo, Moses Kotane and Ronnie Kasrils.
20 December, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on the international regulations for the prevention of collisions at sea, 1972.
21 December, The lengthy trial ends of nine black nationalist student leaders, first detained by Security Police in October 1974, following a pro-FRELIMO Durban rally. They are found guilty under the Terrorism Act and sentenced to periods of imprisonment, three for six years and six for five years.
26 December, South Africa proclaimed the independence of one of the bantustans, the Transkei, independent. On the same day the General Assembly rejected the “sham“ declaration of independence.
29 December, The Minister of Bantu Education announces moves towards the introduction of free and compulsory education for blacks. This is the fifth concession to black demands since the Soweto riots of 16 June 1976. It has also reversed the Afrikaans ruling in schools, suspended the ‘homeland citizenship’ requirement for blacks leasing houses in townships, introduced a home ownership scheme and agrees in principle to give increased powers to Bantu Councils in black areas.
Police announce the release of the last of the 113 detainees held under Section 10 (preventive detention) of the Internal Security Act. Restriction orders are placed on six of those released, including Winnie Mandela.
31 December, In his New Year’s Eve address the Prime Minister warns the country that South Africa will have to face the Communist onslaught in Southern Africa alone.
Then Prime Minister BJ Vorster says: “The storm has not struck yet. We are only experiencing the whirlwinds that go before it.“
An official of the Department of Justice claims that all detainees held in preventive detention under the Internal Security Act have been released.
The prohibition of public gatherings (under the Riotous Assemblies Act) is extended to 31 March 1977, and thereafter to 30 September 1977.
Winnie Mandela is elected to the Black Parents Committee. Mass detentions follows and she is one of six executive members of the Federation of Black Women to be detained. She is released and banned again.
Sisulu’s wife Albertina diagnosed with diabetes.
Sisulu writes to Minister of Justice protesting against Lindiwe's continued detention.
Fietas, Johannesburg: The security forces, accompanied by other departmental officials and dogs forcibly remove remaining traders from their shops in Pageview.
Bophuthatswana independence.
KwaZulu proclaimed a self-governing territory.
Community Councils Act No 125:
Provided for the establishment of community councils, and for civil and criminal judicial powers to be conferred in certain black townships.
Repealed by 56 A of the Black Local Authorities Act No 102 of 1982.
Proclamation R174: (Government Gazette 5716 of 19 August 1977)Laid down certain regulations for the administration of declared security districts in Bophuthatswana (SRR 1977: 1-2).
Proclamation R 252:
Gave the government of Ciskei powers to declare a State of Emergency. Powers repealed by the 1982 National Security Act.
Passed in response to an outbreak of trouble in Venda schools. It is ‘identical to Proclamation 252 of the Ciskei except that an additional clause includes in the definition of subversive statements or actions, the threatening of a scholar or by any means influencing him to refrain from attending classes or sitting for any examination.
The period for continuous military service for white youths is increased to two years.
230 000 people are arrested for pass law offences.
Funds for Bantu Education increased from R78 million in 197677 to R117 million in 197778.
Only about 3 000 pupils out of a possible 27 000 pupils applied for re-admission to Soweto schools.
Baleka Kgositsile goes to Tanzania and becomes the first secretary of the regional Women’s Section of the ANC.
Winnie Mandela is banished to Brandfort in the Orange Free State.
Mamphela Ramphele is banished to rural Northern Transvaal where she forms the Isutheng Community Health Programme.
In Lesotho, she joins the ANC and becomes involved in welfare work for political exiles, children who had fled the country.
Robert McBride and his father begin to develop a very close relationship.
The National Football League (NFL) folds.
SABC-TV makes its first broadcast of a South African football match.
1 January, Four senior members of the Soweto Students’ Representative Council (SSRC) are arrested.
10 January, Prime Minister Vorster pays a three-day goodwill visit to Transkei. Tributes are paid to him for his assistance in helping Transkei gain independence in a peaceful manner.
19 January, Six members of the thirty-six member United Party Parliamentary caucus are expelled from the Party for refusing to abide by the Party’s decision to accept the Marais programme for the formation of a new united opposition party. They decide to establish themselves as a ‘centrist’ Independent United Party.
21 January, At the opening of Parliament the State President states that it has become necessary for South Africa to maintain an increased military capability on the northern border of Namibia to prevent terrorist incursions and to protect the local inhabitants. This is being done at the explicit request of the governments of Ovamboland, Kavango and Caprivi.
24 January, Introducing a motion of no-confidence in the government, the leader of the United Party (UP) Sir de Villiers Graaff delineates the multiple dimensions of the crisis facing South Africa - in economics, race relations and international affairs. He argues that it is time to destroy apartheid before it destroys South Africa.
25 January, A group of clergymen of seven Christian churches - including the Roman Catholic, Anglican and Methodist churches - calling themselves ‘Ministers Fraternal’ publish a report blaming the riot police for their role in the violence in the Cape Town townships at Christmas 1976. Their report is banned.
The Minister of Justice and Police, J. Kruger claims the internal unrest and riots are not the result of the government’s apartheid policies but are instigated by Communists and the ANC.
Under an Indemnity Bill, retroactive to 16 June 1976, police and other members of security forces acting in good faith to prevent disorder, maintain public safety or preserve life and property, will be immune from civil or criminal prosecution. It is passed with the support of the opposition, on 1 February 1977.
Under the Civil Protection Bill, introduced on this date, the Minister of Defence is given power to declare a State of Emergency for three months in the event of natural disasters, or internal disorders and civil disruption.
27 January, Police in Cape Town arrest thirty two members of the Comrades Movement, a student organisation arising from the unrest in the townships in 1976. They face several charges of arson.
Prime Minister Vorster denies the possibility of South Africa pressuring the Rhodesian government into accepting a dictated solution. Demands to shut South Africa’s borders and impose boycotts will not be acceded to.
1 February, KwaZulu proclaimed a self-governing territory.
5 February, The government, for the first time, releases the official list of all detained under the Preventive Detention clause of the Internal Security Act since its introduction on 11 August 1976. The total number of detainees is given as 135.
9 February, The Prime Ministers of South Africa and Rhodesia meet in Cape Town for talks on the Rhodesian problem and the possibilities for settlement.
South Africa signs a multilateral trade proces verbal extending the declaration on the provisional accession of Colombia to GATT.
10 February, The Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference decides to uphold the rights of conscientious objectors, expresses its perturbation over reports of police brutality and deaths in detention, calls for an investigation and protests against the provision of legal indemnity for the police. At the close of their conference, a twenty-one point action programme is issued for guidance in future stances to be taken.
11 February, In a ‘Declaration of Commitment’ the Bishops’ Conference states it will promote black consciousness in solidarity with all those who work for the legitimate aspirations of oppressed people.
The appointment of South Africa’s Ambassador to the United States, R.F. ‘Pik’ Botha, as the country’s next Foreign Minister, is announced by the Prime Minister and welcomed by black delegates at the United Nations.
12 February, The Prime Minister of Lesotho, Leabua Jonathan, claims the whole of the Orange Free State, Matatiele in Natal, the Herschel district in the Transkei and the Southern Sotho homeland of Qwa Qwa for Lesotho - areas, he says, fraudulently taken from it during the Basotho wars.
13 February, ‘Kowie’ Marais announces that it has not been possible for the opposition parties to arrive at an agreed interpretation of the ‘fourteen principles’ contained in his programme.
15 February, Between March 1976 and 15 February 1977, a total of eighteen black people have died while in police custody, the causes of death being officially described as suicide, accident or natural causes.
17 February, The Anglican church joins the growing confrontation between church and state, when the Archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Rev. William Barnett issues a statement condemning South African society as morally indefensible. He expresses particular concern over deaths in detention and the imprisonment and interrogation of people ‘until they die’.
23 February, The Minister of Justice and the Police, Jimmy Kruger states that a full-scale judicial commission of inquiry into deaths in detention is not necessary since there is a full judicial enquiry into each separate death.
24 February, Justice spokesman for the opposition parties, Radclyffe Cadman for the United Party, and Helen Suzman for the Progressive Reform Party, reject Kruger’s explanations and call for a full-scale judicial commission of enquiry.
March, Fietas, Johannesburg: The people of Pageview stage a spontaneous march from Pageview to the Oriental Plaza, through the Plaza and back to Pageview to register their protest against their evictions
2 March, The United Party suffers reverses in municipal elections in the Transvaal and fails to contest the Randburg seats because of internal dissension. It loses control of Johannesburg for the first time in thirty-one years. Of the forty-six seats in this key election, the National Party wins fifteen (a gain of five), the Progressive Reform Party nineteen (a gain of two) and the United Party eleven.
7 March, The Defence Amendment Bill, first published on 31 January 1977, becomes law. Under it the State President is empowered to invoke powers of censorship and of commandeering premises. Service in defence of the Republic now includes anti-terrorist operations as well as the prevention and suppression of internal disorder and there can be greater flexibility and speed in mobilization.
8 March, Chief Matanzima names various areas of South Africa that should be added to Transkei. The Ministry of Bantu Administration denies that any historical claim to the land exists. Any land still to be acquired by Transkei has already been scheduled in the 1976 agreement.
9 March, Paramount Chief Sigcau of Transkei tells the Assembly that legislation is to be introduced making it a capital offence to criticize Transkeian sovereignty or office bearers of the state. It will be made retrospective to October 1975.
10 March, In the Senate the United Party calls for the convening by the Prime Minister of a conference of all race groups to discuss a constitutional structure which would satisfy the legitimate political aspirations of all groups. John Vorster rejects this call, reiterating that the National Party did not, and never would support power-sharing between whites and blacks.
The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, M.C. Botha, reports that following Transkei’s land claims a thorough inquiry was by the South African Archives into the documents and charts involving the land concerned. No claim to the land can be substantiated. The report has been made available to Chief Matanzima.
Under the Criminal Procedure Bill, opposed by both the United Party and he Progressive Reform Party, the judicial system is altered by the introduction of pre-trial interrogation by judicial officers.
16 March, Indemnity Act No 2:
Retrospective to 16 June 1976
19 March, In a joint declaration the leaders of the United Party. Sir de Villiers Graaff and the Democratic Party, Theo Gerdener, express their agreement to form a new party on the basis of equal rights for all racial groups in South Africa. No actual unification is immediately announced.
21 March, Steven Biko, former SASO leader, released on 30 November 1976 after temporary detention under security laws, is re-arrested.
30 March, During an emergency debate in Transkei’s Parliament in Umtata, Chief Matanzima threatens to cut diplomatic links with South Africa and to launch an ‘armed struggle’ unless the land claim to East Griqualand is settled. The opposition leader, Cromwell Diko, hints at possible military assistance from the Soviet Union.
In the 1977-78 Budget introduced by the Minister of Finance, Senator Owen Horwood, the amount to be spent on defence is given as Rl,654 in., twenty-two per cent more than in 1976-77 and constituting more than 18 per cent of the national budget. To raise money the Defence Force will launch a Defence Bond scheme.
31 March, A Defence White Paper analyzes South Africa’s defence requirements in the context of the Soviet and Cuban intervention in Angola. South Africa is to be placed on a war footing.
1 April, ‘Pik’ Botha becomes Minister of Foreign Affairs, in succession to Dr. Hilgard Muller who retires.
2 April, The South African Newspapers’ Union issues its own press code for the daily handling of news.
South Africa Signs treaty with Botswana on the avoidance of double taxation and the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income.
15 April, South Africa Signs multilateral agreement on the total catch quota of hake in 1977.
25 April, The Chief of Staff (Operations) says that the development of South Africa’s defence has made the country completely self-sufficient from an arms point of view.
The government for the first time allows twenty local journalists, five correspondents of international news agencies and two official photographers to visit the prison on Robben Island, where 370 men convicted under security legislation are held. The material conditions are considered in general to be satisfactory, but the lack of contact with the outside world is very severe.
27 April, Police confront some 10,000 students demonstrating against rent increases in Soweto and violence ensues. The offices of the Urban Bantu Council in Soweto are attacked. The government later suspends rent increases for one month, pending investigation of alternative financing.
May, Sisulu's daughter Lindiwe released from prison.
9 May, A Second Defence Amendment Bill passes its final stages in the House of Assembly, with the support of the entire opposition. The existing twelve months’ maximum national service will be increased to twenty-four months and the subsequent period of service increased to a maximum of 240 days.
11 May, According to a report by the South African Institute of Race Relations, a total of 617 black persons, of whom it names 558, are known to have died by violence since June 1976 in the townships, including at least eighty five children and youths, of whom fifty three have been shot.
In a by-election at Westdene, Johannesburg, ‘Pik’ Botha as National Party candidate defeats the Herstigte Nasionale Party by 9,126 votes to 652 - the biggest majority ever obtained in a Parliamentary election. The opposition United Party did not contest the seat.
12 May, Pik’ Botha sees his election victory as a mandate to bring about internal change and to move away from discrimination.
16 May, Winnie Mandela, placed under restriction in Soweto on 28 December 1976 is now banished to a black township outside Brandfort, Orange Free State. She is free to live in Swaziland, or Transkei, but elects to remain in South Africa.
17 May, A committee of inquiry appointed by the Administrators of Natal and the Cape Province, declares that East Griqualand (claimed by Transkei) has never been a black tribal territory, but has for 115 years been an area of Griqua, coloured and white settlement. The area is subsequently transferred from the Cape Province to Natal with effect from 1 January 1978.
A Whites-only referendum in SWA gives a support on Black majority.
19 May, The United States Vice President, Walter Mondale and the Prime Minister, John Vorster, meet in Vienna for two days of high level talks. Some measure of agreement is reached on the Namibia and Rhodesia situations, but on the central issue of the government’s apartheid policies, vital differences in outlook remain.
21 May, The United States Ambassador to the United Nations, Andrew Young, pays a two-day visit to South Africa at the invitation of Harry Oppenheimer. He meets Soweto student leaders, black and white community leaders, newspaper editors and addresses a business dinner. He maintains economic pressure can bring about radical changes.
24 May, Minister of National Education, Dr. Piet Koornbof, tells a conference in Cape Town that South Africa is moving in the direction of a confederal or canton’ political system, and cultural pluralism. He is publicly supported by the Minister of Defence, P.W. Botha, chairman of the special committee on adaptations to the present Westminster-style of government.
The leadership of the Herstigte Nasionale Party is relinquished by its veteran founder, Dr. Albert Hertzog. He is succeeded by the deputy leader, Jaap Marais.
27 May, The Independent United Party decides to adopt the name of the South African Party (SAP).
The Prime Minister rejects the idea of a ‘canton’ system saying it is certainly not practical politics at this stage.
28 May, At its inaugural Congress in Pretoria, the South African Party commits itself to a federal or confederal solution to the country’s political future, the maintenance of separate group identities under white leadership, and the rejection of power-sharing at every level.
Differences about citizen and land become a major issue between the government and the Bophuthatswana ‘homeland’, due to become independent in December 1977.
June, Sisulu’s daughter Lindiwe goes into exile.
June - October, Political unrest results in destruction of property by rioting demonstrators, in clashes with police and in hundreds of arrests. The authorities nevertheless reaffirm their ability to maintain law and order.
June, The Urban Bantu Councils collapsed when the majority of its members resigned under pressure from students.
3 June, The Explosives Amendment Bill is supported by all parties. It provides for a minimum sentence of three years’ imprisonment without the option of a fine for threatening to explode any explosive device or knowingly to render false information in respect of a threatened explosion. During 1976 the police had had to investigate 149 bomb threats.
4 June, A five year restriction order is served on Father S. Mkhatshwa, Secretary of the South African Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SACBC), signed by the Minister of Justice.
10 June, Second International Trade Union Conference for Action against Apartheid, Palais des Nations, Geneva, organised by the Workers' Group of the ILO Governing Body in cooperation with the UN Special Committee against Apartheid.
Stellenbosch University announces that it is to open its doors to black, coloured and Asian students for all post-graduate degree courses and will also accept non-white undergraduates for courses not offered at their own universities.
15 June, Sporadic outbreaks of violence occur on the anniversary of the Soweto, Sharpeville riots, but there are fewer incidents than were anticipated and the called for work stayaway is only partially successful.
16 June, A four-day conference to examine racism, colonialism and apartheid in South Africa is held in Lisbon, Portugal, organized by an Afro-Arab solidarity group, the United Nations and the Helsinki-based World Peace Council. It is timed to coincide with the Sharpeville anniversary.
20 June, Twelve Africans (eleven men and one woman) appear in court in Pretoria accused of setting up a transport route to smuggle recruits out of South Africa through Swaziland into Mozambique for military training and of using the same route to bring arms, ammunition and explosives back into the country. The charges also include creating secret cells for banned organisations and sabotage of a railway line in October 1976.
23 June, The Chief Executive Officer of the Kangwane Territorial Authority, Chief M. Dhlamini, is removed from office following a vote of no-confidence after he refuses to sign a land consolidation proposal by Pretoria. In a Supreme Court action against the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, it is found that Dhlamini has been wrongfully deposed and that the subsequent election of Enos J. Mabusa, and six others, is null and void.
Violence erupts in Soweto again and at least 146 arrests are made by the police. 24 June 1977 The programme for a new white ‘centrist’ party is published by Sir de Villiers Graaff, leader of the United Party, Vause Raw, Chairman of the UP’s steering committee and Theo Gerdener, leader of the Democratic Party. A confederal basis is recommended. 28 June 1977 The United Party, the official opposition since 1948, disbands itself. The decision to disband is opposed by a group of Parliamentarians. a senator and six members of the House of Assembly led by J.D. du P. (Japie) Basson, who intends to cooperate with the Progressive Reform Party to form a new opposition.
29 June, A new opposition party, the New Republic Party (NRP) is formed at a special congress in Johannesburg, by a merger between the United Party and the Democratic Party.
30 June, The Security Police detain J. Tugwana of the Rand Daily Mail, the fifth journalist to be held without trial since February 1977.
July, End July:Two contentious pieces of legislation come into operation. The first, the Criminal Procedure Act, replacing an earlier Act of the same name, effectively replaces the British-style ‘innocent until proved guilty’ system with the continental inquisitorial system, but without the checks and balances European countries have developed. The second, the Lower Courts Amendment Act, vests considerable new powers in the country’s regional courts, providing magistraters with the jurisdiction to hear terrorism and sabotage cases, greatly increasing the scope of the Terrorism Act.
July, It is announced that heavily armed police are patrolling the border to intercept armed insurgents from entering the country and to prevent youths from leaving for military training.
6 July, The Coloured Labour Party strengthened its position by forging an alliance with six members of the Coloured Representative Council (CRC) founded on the rejection of apartheid. Unity talks are held and it is decided unequivocally to tell the government that the present political dispensation is unacceptable.
Makhaya Ntini, SA cricket player, is born.
14 July, The New Zealand government announces steps to discourage sporting contacts with South Africa.
22 July, Criminal Procedure Act No 51:
Consolidates the law relating to procedure in criminal proceedings. Repeals the 1955 Criminal Procedure Act and its numerous amendments except for ss 319(3) and 384.
IN FORCE (as amended by the Criminal Procedure Second Amendment Act No 75 of 1995): CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE.
Intelligence Service and State Security Council Act No 16:
Provided for a state security advisory board in which South Africa played a role.
23 July, The co-founder of the recently formed New Republic Party, Theo Gerdener, announces that he is withdrawing his support from it.
With her underground cell arrested Phyllis is ordered to leave the
country. She leaves for Lesotho.
25 July, The trial ends in the Natal Supreme Court in Pietermaritzburg of five Africans - all of whom have previous convictions for subversive activities or sabotage - with sentences of life imprisonment. Four others are sentenced to prison terms of from seven to eighteen years for various terrorist activities. Among the defendants, described by the Judge as dedicated revolutionaries, is Themba Harry Gwala. 26 July 1977 The ‘Committee of 10’ formed by prominent Soweto residents, issue a programme for the election of a new community board to have total autonomy in Soweto including powers to levy taxes and to control education, the police and local elections. The Minister of Justice rejects this and the government remains committed to community councils with limited powers, control being retained by the Bantu Administration Board.
27 July There is further unrest in the townships throughout the country including those of Alexandra (Northern Johannesburg), Atteridgeville and Saulsville (Pretoria) and in Soweto.
29 July, A prisoner in the isolation section at Robben Island is caught in possession of an exercise book in which notes were made of the history of the so-called freedom struggle. The documents are referred to a graphologist of the SA Police who, on 17 August 1977, certifies that the documents had been drawn up by Sisulu and Mandela.
August - September, Long prison sentences are imposed in a number of trials for subversive activities.
The government’s constitutional proposals are widely rejected by black and coloured leaders and severely criticized by white opposition leaders and academics.
3 August, Dr. Motlana, on behalf of the ‘Committee of 10’ repeats the call for non-ethnic elections for an autonomous Soweto city council.
10 August, About 100 white sympathisers join evicted black squatters in a passive protest against the demolition of shanty dwellings outside Cape Town. This was the third day of an operation to remove an estimated 26,000 squatters from three camps.
Signs multilateral treaty relating to the meeting of the whaling nations to allocate quotas for 1976/77 and 1977 whaling seasons.
12 August, Military Discipline Act No 23:
Specified punishment for military disobedience.
13 August, The Foreign Minister of France said at a press conference in Nairobi that no new contract for arms sales to South Africa can be signed in France.
16 August, The Minister of Justice asks for an extension of emergency powers granted to one area troubled by faction fighting to the entire KwaZulu ‘homeland’. His request is turned down.
18 August, Aliens and Travellers Control Act No 29:
Provided for the control and monitoring of aliens, and for refusal of entry.
Stephen Bantu Biko is arrested
20 August, The constitutional proposals are approved by a special session of the National Party Parliamentary caucus. They are subsequently approved unanimously by National Party congresses in the Cape Province, Natal and the Orange Free State.
22 August, World Conference for Action against Apartheid, Lagos, organised by the United Nations in cooperation with the Organisation of African Unity and the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
 World Conference for Action against Apartheid, Lagos, organised by the United Nations in co-operation with the OAU and the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
23 August, American President Carter announces at a press conference that South Africa has promised that no nuclear explosive test will be made now or in the future.
24 August, Government proposals for a new constitutional dispensation are disclosed by the Prime Minister John Vorster. They involve the creation of three separate Parliaments, for whites, coloureds and Asians, of the office of an executive State Presidents, of a Cabinet Council drawn from the three Parliaments, and of an advisory President Council.
26 August, The Prime Minister attacks the double standards of foreign countries in the nuclear field, but announces, conditionally, his willingness to discuss South Africa’s accession to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
31 August, The Prime Minister gives further details of the constitutional plan at a meeting in Durban. While Indian and coloured people are entitled to political rights no separate Parliament is to be created to accommodate urban blacks. Legislation already exists for them to elect their own town councils with powers greater than other local authorities. Also they exercise their political rights in their own homelands.
2 September, The Bophuthatswana electoral office publishes the results of the general election giving Chief Lucas Mangope’s Democratic Party a landslide victory over the opposition Seoposengwe Party.
Foreign Minister ‘Pik’ Botha pays a two-day visit to Israel when Southern African issues are discussed with Prime Minister Begin and Foreign Minister Dayan.
 Acquisition of Immovable Property Control Act No 21:
Provided for state expropriation and other powers.
4 September, Foreign Minister ‘Pik’ Botha meets the President of the Ivory Coast at Lake Geneva for talks covering the dangers threatening Africa internally and externally, and including the Rhodesian situation.
5 September, The Progressive Reform Party and the Basson group merge as the Progressive Federal Party (PFP) with Colin Eglin as party leader, Ray Swart as party chairman and ‘Japie’ Basson as deputy chairman. Its seven key principles include full citizenship rights for all South Africans and the negotiation of a new constitution at a national convention.
9 September, Full details of the proposed constitutional dispensation are given in a memorandum delivered to the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council (CPRC) by the Minister of Coloured Relations, and released on 11 September 1977 by sources close to their Executive. The details are also revealed officially by the Transvaal leader of the National Party, Dr. Connie Mulder, who claims it to be an honest well-intentioned offer.
12 September, The death in detention of Steven Biko, founder and first President of the South African Students’ Organisation (SASO), and later honorary President of the Black People’s Convention (BPC) arouses serious internal and international reactions. The circumstances of his death are the subject of
statements by the Minister of Justice, J. Kruger, on 12, 14 and 16 September. Messages of concern continue including those from Cyrus Vance US Secretary of State and Dr. Kurt Waldheim, the United Nations Secretary-General.
Steve Biko dies in detention in Pretoria after being tortured and beaten by security police. Magistrate Prins delivered the following verdict:
a)The identity of the deceased is Stephen Bantu Biko, Black man, approximately 30 years old;
b)Date of death: 12 September 1977;
c)Cause or likely cause of death: Head injury with associated extensive brain injury, followed by contusion of the blood circulation, disseminated intravascular coagulation as well as renal failure with uraemia. The head injury was probably sustained during the deceased was involved in a scuffle with members of the Security Branch of the South African Police at Port Elizabeth.
The founder and first president of the South African Students Organisation (SASO). Mr Steve Biko, became the 40th person to die in detention. Ten people died in detention that year.
13 September, At the Transvaal National Party Congress the constitutional proposals are accepted by 1,236 votes out of 1,243.
19 September, The Coloured Persons’ Representative Council (CPRC) decide to reject the government’s constitutional proposals and call for a National Convention to negotiate a new constitutional dispensation.
The Trade Union Council of South Africa (TUCSA) elects its first black chairman, Ronnie Webb, at the Council’s annual congress in Durban.
20 September, The Prime Minister announces in Pretoria that he has decided that the House of Assembly and the four Provincial Councils should be dissolved and fresh elections be held on 30 November 1977. Nominations must be declared on 20 October 1977.
Signs trade agreement with the Federal Republic of Germany.
20 September, Foreign Ministers of the European Communities, meeting in Brussels, adopted a code of conduct for corporations operating in South Africa. (The United Kingdom and the Netherlands had adopted such codes earlier).
21 September, Signs agreement with Mozambique on air pooling between SAA and DETA.
22 September, It is reported that the President, Vice-President and Secretary-General of the Hervormde (Reformed Church of the Netherlands) have been refused visas to visit South Africa.
23 September, The Netherlands government suspends its cultural agreement with South Africa and proposed visits by several other Dutch groups are cancelled.
25 September, Steven Biko’s funeral in King William’s Town is attended by some 15,000 people. Twelve Western diplomats are present, including the American Ambassador.
30 September, The World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), Geneva, bans South Africa from further meetings of the organisation and to seek its expulsion from its membership.
The ban on open-air gatherings is further extended until 31 March 1978.
The Ciskei ‘homeland’ government proclaims the introduction of emergency powers, after violent incidents and rioting. The powers allow for ninety days without trial, banishment without decree, prohibition of unauthorized meetings and heavy fines or prison sentences for showing disrespect or disobedience to chiefs and headmen, who remain the instruments of official policy.
Radclyffe M. Cadman is elected national leader of the New Republic Party (NRP). He expects opposition parties to cooperate, but is confident the NRP will become the government of South Africa.
October, The South African government bans 17 organisations and some newspapers.
1 October, Labour Relations Act:
Transkei’s equivalent of the Labour Relations Act [SA].
Set out further requirements for labour in Transkei.
Provided for a minimum wage and wage regulation bodies.
3 October, M.C. Botha, Minister of Bantu Administration and Development announces that he will not stand for re-election and will resign as Minister in November 1977.
5 October, Sir de Villiers Graaff announces his retirement from politics, having been leader of the opposition from 1956 until the dissolution of the United Party on 28 June 1977.
7 October, A government notice gazetted on this date provides for the establishment of an Ndebele Tribal Authority.
Public Security Act No 30:
Repealed all security laws applicable in South Africa (including the 1950 Suppression of Communism Act, the 1930 Riotous Assemblies Act and the 1960 Unlawful Organisations Act). Further, it repealed the Proclamation 400 of 1960 but retained some of its provisions (Horrell 1978: 230; SRR 1977: 336; Dugard 1978: 96).
Sections 44 and 45 repealed by the State of Emergency Act No 86 of 1995.
12 October, Signs multilateral agreement on the additional act of 1972, amending the International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants.
16 October, A total of 128 members of the United States Congress, from both the Democratic and Republican parties send a written request to the South African Ambassador in Washington urging the government to invite an appropriate international body to examine South Africa’s laws and practices relating to detention and to make recommendations, with special reference to the death of Mr. Biko.
19 October, Following a Cabinet decision on 18 October, the government, by proclamation under the Internal Security Act, declared 18 organisations unlawful, arrested some 70 leading Africans, placed a number of people in restriction (inc Donal Woods) and closed down the daily newspaper 'The World' and its associated 'Weekend World'. The actions provoked worldwide shock and protest. The organisations affected included the Black People's Convention (BPC), the South African Student's Organisation (SASO), the Black Parent's Association, the Black Women's Federation and the Union of Black Journalists. Person's arrested included 8 members of the Soweto 'Committee of 10'.
Emergency powers are proclaimed by the government of Venda.
The Foreign Minister hands over a seventy-six room presidential palace, which cost an estimated R1 .8 m. to build to Transkei Head of State, Chief Botha Sigcau as a gift from the Pretoria government. Transkei will celebrate its first anniversary of independence on 26 October 1977.
The United States declares that the Carter Administration will be re-examining its relations with the South African government.
South African Police (SAP) jail dozens of government opponents not previously detained, including The World editor Percy Qoboza.
Banning orders are issued to Beyers NaudÁƒ© and Donald Woods, two prominent Whites who had publicly supported Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM). Justice Minister, Jimmy Kruger places bans on all movements affiliated with the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM). Along with South African Students' Organisation (SASO) and Black People's Convention (BPC) the following organisations are included in the bannings: AASECA, the Black Parents Association, the Black Women's Federation, the Border Youth Organisation, the Christian Institute of Southern Africa (a multi-racial organisation of anti-apartheid churchmen), the Eastern Province Youth Organisation, the Medupe Writers' Association, the Natal Youth Organisation, the Transvaal Youth Organisation, the Union of Black Journalists, and the Western Cape Youth Organisation.
The South African Government banned 17 organisations, including major Black Consciousness organisations, in a massive repression of people’s resistance. World and Weekend World, black newspapers, were banned.
Major black consciousness and other organisations were banned. Fourty-two people were detained and at least seven people were banned. Various newspapers including The World, the Weekend World and a Christian Institute publication, Pro Verlate, were banned.
21 October, The United States, the Netherlands, Great Britain, West Germany and Belgium all recall their Ambassadors for consultations.
Lebowa: Bantu Administration Amendment Act:
24 October, As the United Nations Security Council debate on South Africa opens in New York, a major diplomatic effort begins to deal with South Africa’s severe treatment of its critics and with African demands for mandatory United Nations sanctions.
The Minister of Justice, Police and Prisons receives a report of a police investigation into Mr. Biko’s death and a post-mortem report submitted to the Attorney General of the Transvaal and signed by Professor Johan Loubser, Chief State Pathologist, by Professor 1W. Simpson (University of Pretoria) and by Jonathan Gluckman (pathologist appointed by the Biko family) whose findings are unanimous. Death has been caused by extensive brain damage. Mr. Biko has sustained at least a dozen injuries between eight days and twelve hours of his death.
26 October, The Attorney General of the Transvaal, Jacobus E. Nothling, announces that an inquest into Biko’s death will be held, but that he would not institute criminal proceedings. On 28 October the Attorney General of the Eastern Cape, Carel van der Walt, also declines to institute criminal proceedings.
27 October, President Carter announces that the United States government will support the decision against the sale of arms to South Africa.
28 October, Newspaper and Imprint Registration Act No 19:
Required newspapers to be registered and conform to a code of conduct.
November, The UN Security Council declared that a further acquisition of arms by South Africa would be a threat to international peace. An indefinite arms embargo was imposed.
The National Party won 134 seats in the general election, the highest proportion ever gained by one party in South Africa. 401 people were charged in security trials.
1 November, Signs Convention on Road Traffic.
2 November, Benin, Libya and Mauritius insist that the United Nations Security Council bypass the Western powers arms embargo resolution and instead take up a series of hardline African resolutions paving the way for a total economic and diplomatic blockade of South Africa. They force their resolutions to a vote and America, Britain and France exercise their vetoes.
The South African Indian Council (SAIC) unanimously rejects the government’s proposed new constitution, after two days of lengthy debate and widespread opposition by other Indian leaders.
The United States Secretary of State, Cyrus Vance, announces that two further diplomats have been withdrawn from South Africa, and that the United States will prohibit all exports of military and police equipment to South Africa.
3 November, After a meeting between the Prime Minister John Vorster, with his Ministers of Bantu Administration and seven of the eight ‘homeland’ leaders, a statement is issued in Pretoria that influx control regulations are to be amended to provide greater freedom of movement for urban blacks. ‘Pass books’ are to be abolished and replaced by documents issued by the ‘homeland’ governments.
4 November, The United Nations Security Council unanimously adopts a seven-point resolution imposing a mandatory arms embargo against South Africa.
Security Council unanimously adopted resolution 418 (1977) imposing mandatory arms embargo against South Africa.
Security Council resolution 418 (1977) imposing mandatory arms embargo against South Africa.
8 November, The French Ministry of Defence will no longer permit delivery of two escort vessels (corvettes) and two submarines under construction in French naval yards.
The Prime Minister, reacting to the arms embargo, says that the measure, even if supplemented by an oil embargo, will not seriously harm the Republic.
9 November, It is announced that Transkei and South Africa have signed an extradition agreement. Transkei authorities refuse to say whether it covers political offences. Transkei Interior Minister, Stella Sigcau, daughter of the country’s President Botha Sigcau, resigns. No reason is given.
The Prime Minister of Swaziland says that his government will not allow the country to be used as a base for guerrilla attacks against South Africa. He denies that there are training camps within Swaziland.
10 November, The Minister of Finance, Senator Owen Horwood, announces the government is to spend an additional R250 m. on low-cost housing for Blacks, Coloureds and Asians during the next three years. Changes in property rights will give security of tenure to Blacks living in urban areas.
South Africa signs agreement of co-operation with France regarding the Koeberg Nuclear Power Units 1 & 2.
11 November, The government adopts powers enabling the Minister of Economic Affairs to compel companies to produce strategic and military goods should the need arise. The main consideration is preventing parent companies from controlling the operations of South African subsidiaries should they attempt to forbid local production of strategic equipment.
14 November, The Chairman of the Olympic Games organizing committee announces that Rhodesia and South Africa will be excluded from the 1980 Moscow Olympics.
The inquest into the death of Black Consciousness leader, Steve Biko, opens in Pretoria. Evidence given concerning the autopsy report is widely reported both locally and overseas.
15 November, A non-aggression pact between Bophutliatswana and South Africa is the first of sixty-six treaties signed by the two governments at a special pre-independence ceremony in Pretoria. The agreements will take effect on 6 December 1977.
17 November, A black high school student, Sipho Malaza dies while in Security Police custody. His death is the twenty-first in detention since March 1976.
The P.K. le Roux Dam, an integral part of the Orange River development project to provide electric power, irrigation and flood control - is officially inaugurated by John Vorster the Prime Minister. It was constructed at a cost of R94m.
18 November, The United Nation’s Special Committee against Apartheid approves a draft international declaration against apartheid in sports.
21 November, A Soweto Action Committee is formed to back the plan for the future of Soweto proposed by the ‘Committee of 10’ most of whose members are in detention.
23 November, A National Party candidate and leading economist, Dr. Robert Smit and his wife, Jeanne-Cora, are found murdered in their home in Springs in curious circumstances. Police decline to offer any interpretation.
24 November, A bomb explodes in the Carlton Centre, Johannesburg, injuring sixteen people.
30 November, John Vorster achieves an overwhelming victory in the General Election, taking 136 of the 165 parliamentary seats. The National Party gains eighteen seats from the combined opposition parties. The only opposition party to hold its own is the Progressive Federal Party, which now becomes the official opposition with seventeen seats. The New Republic Party retain ten, the South African Party win three, the Herstigte Nasionale Party none.
1 December, Counsel for Steve Biko’s family, Sydney Kentridge, makes his final submission calling for a verdict that Steve Biko died as the result of a criminal assault on him by one or more of the eight members of the Security Police in whose custody he was on 6 and 7 September. During his four hour address Sydney Kentridge reserves his most serious criticism for two Security Police officers, Colonel Piet Goosen and Major Harold Snyman and two doctors who examined Steve Biko, Dr. Ivor Lang and Dr. Benjamin Tucker.
2 December, The fifteen-day inquest into the death of Steve Biko ends with a three-minute finding by the presiding magistrate, Martinus Prins, who rules that no one can be found criminally responsible for his death in detention. The verdict causes deep concern within South Africa and a storm of protest overseas. Shock is expressed by the United States Secretary of State and consternation by the United Nations Secretary-General.
Two members of Steve Biko’s family, as well as eight other blacks, some of them friends of the Biko family, are detained by police in a pre-dawn raid in Soweto.
3 December, The record of the Biko inquest will now go to the Attorney General of Transvaal who can decide whether there should be any further investigation or any other action taken.
6 December, Bophuthatswana becomes independent at midnight. Its Parliament sits for the first time and elects Chief Lucas Mangope as the country’s Á±rst President. He immediately raises the issues of land consolidation and citizenship. A twelve-man Cabinet, including two whites, is appointed.
Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda refuses to take part in UK
8 December, Sir David Napley, President of the Law Society of England (who attended the Biko inquest as an independent observer at the invitation of the Association of Law Societies of South Africa) issues a twenty-five page report on the inquest in which he severely criticizes police procedure, evidence and investigation (‘perfuctory in the extreme’). Regarding the magistrate’s findings he is in accord, but adds I do not, however, apprehend that it would have been irregular for the Magistrate to have found that the death was caused by one or more of a group of persons without specifying such persons with particularity’.
9 December, The United Nations Security Council unanimously adopts an
African-sponsored resolution setting up a United Nations committee to monitor enforcement of the mandatory arms embargo decreed against South Africa on 4 November 1977.
14 December, The United Nations General Assembly in its thirty-second regular session passes fourteen resolutions on the policy of apartheid and a further resolution on 16 December 1977.
International Declaration against Apartheid in Sports proclaimed by the General Assembly [resolution 32105M)].
16 December, South Africa Signs an agreement for the application of safeguards and privileges with the International Atomic Energy Agency.
20 December, Canada announces it is to withdraw all government support for trade with South Africa. Trade commissioners will be recalled and the Consulate-General in Johannesburg will close. Diplomatic relations will be maintained to give Canada the opportunity to impress on the South African government the necessity for change.
1978
P.W. Botha replaces John Voster as Prime Minister.
Fietas, Johannesburg: By this year all the traders in the area had left and the Oriental Plaza was established in Fordsburg. Fietas had disappeared.
Fietas, Johannesburg: The name Pageview is used more regularly and becomes the generally used term. The area during this period was known as the ‘Malay Location’, ‘Fietas’, ‘Pageview’ and even ‘Vrededorp’, although Vrededorp, a white area, was in fact situated opposite Pageview.
Riotous Assemblies Amendment Act
Amended the 1956 Riotous Assemblies Act [SA] and made provisions relating to the prohibition of gatherings and the dispersal of unlawful gatherings.
Marriage Act No 21:
Made further amendments to the Marriage Act No 4 of 1972, largely in keeping with South African trends.
Lebowa: Social Pensions Act No 11:
Commission of Inquiry into Alleged Irregularities in the Former Department of Information
Mandate: To evaluate and make findings and recommendations on certain evidence of alleged irregularities in the former Department of Information which had come to light through other authorities and through the press; and [for the supplementary report] to extend the inquiry into new facets and areas brought to light in the course of the Commission’s first inquiry.
The (Coloured) Labour Party, (Indian) Reformed Party and Inkatha formed the South African Black Alliance.
It is estimated that 4 000 refugees were undergoing military training in Angola, Mocambique, Libya and Tanzania.
9 832 persons were removed to the homelands.
1 096 publications were banned and 300 films banned or subjected to age restrictions and excision.
Helen Suzman receives a United Nations Human Rights Award
Robert McBride assists his father in his workshop Utility Services'. At some point in 1978/79 his father begins burglar guards, fire-staircases and other light engineering steel work. This draws him away from his studies and favourite sport, rugby, at which he is very skilled but has little scope for development.
Robert is also involved in the collection of payment from customers, and has many encounters with gangs.
Wits University stuns Kaizer Chiefs (3-2) in the first Mainstay Cup final.
The American Television Channel, CBS, interviews Thabo Mbeki age 36 on the South African political situation and apartheid. Thabo give a hint that the ANC is abandoning the arm struggle and is prepare to negotiate for a peaceful transition of a democratic elected government in South Africa.
1 January, The study privileges of Sisulu and Mandela are permanently withdrawn.
6 January, Donald Woods, banned editor of the Daily Dispatch (East London) reaches Britain with his family, having fled South Africa via Lesotho and Botswana. The pro-government Afrikaans press launches a virulent campaign against him: the British and American press in contrast give wide and sympathetic coverage to the story of his escape.
8 January, The murder of political scientist and author  Dr Richard Turner, in Durban, by an untraced assassin, is thought to have political implications. As one of eight leaders of NUSAS (the National Union of South African Students) Dr. Turner was served with a banning order in 1973.
11 January, A meeting is held in Ulundi between Chief Gatsha Buthelezi (Inkatha), Sonny Leon (Coloured Labour Party) and Y.S. Chinsamy (Indian Reform Party) who agree to formulate a common strategy against the government’s race policies.
12 January, The Transkei government is to ban the South African Methodist Church, and replace it with a Transkei Methodist Church, which will acquire all the previous church’s assets. The South African Council of Churches calls on Transkei to reconsider its decision.
22 January, At a meeting of the newly organized Soweto Students’ League it is decided to continue the students’ boycott of State schools, to call for a national conference to launch a new education system and to take no part in elections to the Soweto Community Council.
25 January, Government assurances are given that reform will be introduced, appeals for return to schools are made and between fifty and seventy per cent of pupils respond.
In a government reorganisation following the elections of 30 November 1977, John Vorster reappoints most his Ministers, but mades a limited number of changes.
26 January, Signs agreement with Taiwan on mutual fishing relations.
Amnesty International’s detailed report on human rights violations in South Africa is banned. It presents comprehensive documentation on deaths in detention, detention without trial, treatment of convicted political prisoners, bannings and banishment.
At the request of the African delegates, Donald Woods addresses the United Nations Security Council and urges member states to pursue a policy of disengagement from all ties with South Africa.
31 January, Jimmy Kruger announces in the House of Assembly that new measures for the protection of political detainees and prisoners are being considered and that all police instructions on their treatment will be reviewed.
February, Thabo Mbeki delivers a speech at the Seminar held in Ottawa in Canada about the historical injustice in South Africa.
Thabo Mbeki is recalled into the political mainstream at African National Congress headquarters in Lusaka. He is appointed Oliver Tambos political secretary and Director of Information.
1 February, When nominations for the Soweto Community Council close, only twenty-nine candidates have been nominated. Sixteen are later disqualified on technical grounds, nine are returned unopposed and the other four will stand for election in two wards.
2 February, Chief Matanzima announces that all South Africans seconded to the Transkei Army will leave Transkei by 31 March 1978.
The Attorney-General of the Eastern Cape states that he will not prosecute any police involved in the arrest and detention of Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko.
3 February, The Minister of Foreign Affairs, ‘Pik’ Botha, says in the House of Assembly that the Biko affair has done unending harm to South Africa.
9 February, Winnie Mandela, restricted to a black township at Brandfort (Orange Free State), is sentenced to six months’ imprisonment (suspended for four years) for breaking her banning and house arrest order by receiving unauthorized visits by friends and relatives. Earlier four white women had been sentenced to prison terms for refusing to give evidence as to whether they had visited Winnie Mandela.
South Africa is to make its own missiles. Kentron (Pty) Ltd, a newly formed subsidiary of ARMSCOR (the South African Armaments Corporation) will produce these.
15 February, The Prime Minister states that South Africa is still committed to granting independence to Namibia before the end of 1978.
16 February, The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, Dr. Connie Mulder, announces that he will in future be known as the Minister of Plural Relations and Development, reflecting the plural nature of the population.
18 February, The election of the first government sponsored Soweto Community Council is poorly supported. Nine candidates are returned unopposed, nineteen wards attract no candidates at all. In the two wards contested the percentage poll is less than 6 per cent. The elections fill only eleven of the thirty seats.
27 February, Robert M. Sobukwe, founder of the Pan Africanist Congress, dies of cancer at the age of fifty-three and is buried in his home town, Graaff Reniet.
28 February, The Minister of Justice announces that detainees held under security laws will soon he allowed to have monthly visits from doctors and legal representatives.
1 March, KwaZulu: Black Taxation Amendment Act No 13:
10 March, Percy Qoboza, editor of the banned newspaper, The World, is released from detention, together with nine other black leaders seized in security raids in October 1976.
11 March, The government agrees to eliminate racial segregation in theatres but not in cinemas.
13 March, The first public rally of the new South African Black Alliance (SABA) is held under the leadership of Chief Gatsha Buthelezi in Cape Town. Its main objective is to convene a National Convention of representatives of all population groups to seek a peaceful, negotiated solution to the country’s problems. The Dikwankwetla Party from the Qwa Qwa ‘homeland’ is joining the alliance. The organisations represented will not merge, however, since to do so would infringe the Political and Interference Act of 1968 which bans inter-racial mixing in political parties.
15 March, A Durban magistrate rules that no one is to blame for the death of a young Indian dentist, Dr. Hoosen Haffejee, who died in police custody in August 1977. It is found that he committed suicide.
21 March, South Africa is informed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that it may not re-apply to join the world sporting body. Consequently South Africa will not be able to send any teams to the Olympic Games in Moscow.
It is reported that about 15,000 students have returned to secondary schools in Soweto and that thirty-two of the forty state-run schools in the townships will re-open by the beginning of April.
21 March, International Anti-Apartheid Year [proclaimed by the General Assembly in resolution 32105B of 14 December 1977].
23 March, Three more detainees are released: the Chairman of the ‘Committee of, Dr. N. Motlana, a member of the Committee, L. Mosala, and Soweto Journalist, Aggrey Klaaste.
29 March, Chief Minister of Venda, Chief Patrick Mphephu is to hold talks with John Vorster on the issue of homeland independence.
April, Mid-April. Brigadier C.F. Zietsman, the head of the Security Police, confirms that African National Congress (ANC) guerrillas have been involved in skirmishes with counter-insurgency forces in the Eastern Transvaal.
April, End April.A new black political movement, the Azanian People’s Organisation (AZAPO), is formed at an inaugural conference at Roodepoort, near Johannesburg. It is open to Blacks, Coloureds and Indians, but closed to Whites. It adopts the slogan of the banned Black People’s Convention - ‘One Azania, one People’ and will oppose all institutions created by the government, from homelands to Community Councils.
April, The Azanian People's Organisation (AZAPO) is formed.
1 April, The Office of the Canadian Consul-General in Johannesburg closes.
4 April, Dr. Andries Treurnicht is re-appointed as a Deputy Minister of Plural Relations. Opposition spokesperson Helen Suzman calls this an insensitive move.
5 April, Formation of Azanian People’s Organisation (AZAPO)
10 April, Chief Kaiser Matanzima, Prime Minister of Transkei, announces that his government has decided to sever its diplomatic relations with the Republic of South Africa. The announcement follows the adoption of a Bill transfering the control of East Griqualand from Cape Province to Natal, with effect from 1 April 1978.
11 April, Fifty Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) members arrested by Swaziland government orders, are to be expelled from Swaziland. They are accused of being involved in faction fighting and of providing arms and training people in the use of arms. South Africa has not requested their detention or deportation.
The South African Prime Minister expresses regret at Chief Matanzima’s declaration, which is to his own disadvantage, but states that South Africa will continue to honour its obligations to Transkei, including financial assistance.
13 April, Chief Matanzima says he will demand majority rule in South Africa.
17 April, Minister of Defence, P.W. Botha, announces that a new army base is to be built at Phalaborwa, and that a new airhase has been constructed at Hoedspruit in the Eastern Transvaal.
25 April, Sixteen of the independent members of the Transkei Assembly announce that they have formed the Transkei National Progressive Party (TNPP) under the leadership of C. Mda, a former chief whip of the TNIP and earlier a member of the Democratic Party.
28 April, The South African Defence Headquarters state that Transkei soldiers will not be admitted for training courses in South Africa until diplomatic relations are normalized.
Venda’s request for ‘independence’ has been granted and the second half of 1979 set as the target date.
A new black political movement, the  (AZAPO),, at an inaugural conference at Roodepoort, near Johannesburg. It is open to Blacks, Coloureds and Indians, but closed to Whites. It adopts the slogan of the banned Black People’s Convention - ‘One Azania, one People’ and will oppose all institutions created by the government, from homelands to Community Councils.
2 May, PAC Central Committee announce in Dar es Salaam that its chairman, Potlako Leballo, is to retire for health reasons.
4 May, AZAPO’s two principal leaders, I. Mkhabela and L. Mabasa are arrested in Soweto. Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu protests and queries why the authorities are so unwilling to listen to the voices of authentic black leaders.
South African troops attacked Cassinga in Angola and killed hundreds of SWAPO refugees.
6 May, Eschel Rhoodie, the Secretary for Information, reveals that he has been operating a secret fund for which he was accountable only to a three-member Cabinet Committee and which has never been approved by Parliament.
8 May, The newly-formed Transkei National Progressive Party (TNPP) is recognized as the official opposition in the National Assembly.
John Vorster declares that he has personally authorized the Department of Information to use secret funds without Parliamentary approval for purposes in the highest national interest. There will be a full investigation into alleged irregularities.
10 May, Transkei abrogates its non-aggression pact with South Africa. From this date, Chief Matanzima says no South African military aircraft will be allowed overflying rights, neither will ships of the South African Navy be allowed into Transkeian waters.
12 May, The Minister of Justice, Police and Prisons, Jimmy Kruger, tells Parliament that nearly 700 terrorists were arrested in 1977 and of these ninety-one bad had terrorist training. At present sixty-six terrorist trials are in progress.
19 May, Undesirable Organisations Act No 9:
Granted the state power to act against illegal organisations.
24 May, Legislation for three major components of the governments plans to defuse black grievances is introduced. Bills provide for ninety-nine year leases to be granted to qualified urban blacks; for black identity documents to be replaced by travel documents issued by ‘homeland’ governments; and for the
word ‘Bantu’ to be replaced by the word ‘Black’ in all government legislation.
26 May, The Transkei Minister of Justice orders the Methodist Church of South Africa to cease all activities, and cede its property within six months. The property is insured for R3.6m.
2 June, A new independent Methodist Church of Transkei is proclaimed at a conference in Umtata.
3 June, Security Police chief. Brigadier C.F. Zietsman, announces that about 4,000 South African exiles are undergoing guerrilla training in Mozambique, Angola, Tanzania and Libya; of these about three quarters have been recruited by the ANC.
15 June, The Department of Information is to be disbanded and replaced by a Bureau for National and International Communications, for which Dr. Connie Mulder will be responsible. Dr. E. Rhoodie will resign. An evaluation of secret projects will he made by General H.J. van den Bergh, head of the Bureau of State Security.
The new Soweto Council is inaugurated. The Council, under the Chairmanship of David Thehahadi, is given considerable powers, hut its decisions have to he ratified by the Minister of Plural Relations, and are not subject to approval by either the Johannesburg City Council or the West Rand Administration Board.
South Africa signs treaty with the Perishable Products Export Control Board for the ocean conveyance of goods between South Africa and Europe.
16 June, The anniversary of Sharpevillie passes off without serious incidents. The main service in Soweto is held by Bishop Desmond Tutu and addressed by Dr. N. Motlana who is later warned by Sowetos Police Chief. Brigadier Jan Visser. against making any more inflamatory speeches.
30 June, 14 390 people were convicted on unrest related charges.
July, A Uruguayan universities soccer team arrives in South Africa for a five match tour.
18 July, The ANC’s President-General, Nelson Mandela, celebrates his sixtieth birthday on Robben Island.
20 July, In reaction to further deaths of people in police detention, ten policemen have been suspended from duty and six have been charged with murder.
14 August, World Conference to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination, Geneva.
21 August, The State President Dr. Nicoiaas J. Diederichs dies of a heart attack. Following an earlier heart attack on 12 August he had been temporarily succeeded as State President by Senator Marais Viljoen.
24 August, John Vorster announces that while Dr. Connie Mulder will remain Minister of Plural Relations and Development, the Bureau for National and International Communications will be placed under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as from I September 1978.
September, End Sept. An Ivory Coast delegation arrives in Transkei on an official visit. The mission is the first from a black African country.
6 September, Sonny Leon, leader of the Labour Party in the Coloured Representative Council (CRC), resigns, ostensibly for health reasons. His resignation raises the possibility of a split between the Left and Right wings of his party.
12 September, On the eve of the first anniversary of the death of Steve Biko, police arrest sixteen people including his brother, his sister and her husband and close friends of the family. No reason is given to them hut police say the arrests are preventive measures covered by the 1977 Internal Security Act.
13 September, The Venda Independence Party (VIP) boycotts the opening of the Venda Parliament despite having won thirty-one of the forty-two elected seats. The boycott is prompted by the arrest, after the election of twelve of the new VIP Parliamentarians. They were detained together with nearly forty other opposition supporters.
15 September, France returns the deposit paid by South Africa for two corvettes and two submarines. Their order was cancelled by France in November 1977 in accordance with an international arms embargo against South Africa.
20 September, Prime Minister Vorster announces that he will resign shortly, for health reasons, but that he will be available for election as the next State President.
21 September, Seven more people are detained in Venda, bringing the total number of detentions since the opposition Venda Independence Party won a majority of elected seats in the Legislative Assembly. The Pretoria government’s inaction in persuading Venda to charge or release the detainees is widely criticized, since South Africa is still technically responsible for the administration of Venda.
25 September, The trial begins of eleven Soweto students charged under the Terrorism Act. The fifty-six page indictment alleges that as officers, members or supporters of the now banned Soweto Students’ Representative Council (SSRC) they conspired to commit sedition and terrorism between May 1976 and October 1977.
27 September, A Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry has found no irregularities in the accounts of the Department of Information. However a wider inquiry is still in progress to examine the purposes for which the money was spent and to establish whether the officials involved have received any financial gain from their actions.
28 September, The caucus of the National Party elects as party leader, and thereby as Prime Minister, Pieter Willem Botha, the Minister of Defence and leader of the National Party in the Cape Province. He declares that there will be no immediate changes in the composition of the Cabinet and that he himself will retain the Defence portfolio.
29 September, The Electoral College elects B.J. Vorster as State President by 173 votes to the nineteen cast for Sir de Villiers Graaff, former Leader of the opposition, nominated by the New Republic Party and the twelve cast for Professor G. Bozzoli, Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand, proposed by the Progressive Federal Party.
30 September, South Africa Signs treaty with Japan on certain portions of land granted to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission at Yokohama.
October, The Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU) is formed.
2 October, The Transkei will resist the government’s plan for a mass removal of nearly 20,000 blacks from the Crossroads settlement near Cape Town, to a settlement centre on land due to be incorporated into Transkei.
3 October, At the end of a ten-day inquest, LA. Coetzee, Deputy Chief Magistrate of Port Elizabeth, rules that no one is to blame for the death of L. Tabalaza who died after falling from the fifth floor of the Port Elizabeth Security Police headquarters on 10 July 1978. Mr. Tabalaza was not a detainee under the Terrorism Act, nevertheless a high level police inquiry had been ordered into his death.
10 October, B.J. Vorster is sworn in as State President in Pretoria, the occasion being marked by a display of the country’s military forces, including a fly-past of Mirage fighter bombers and Impala jet trainers.
P.W. Botha makes a number of changes in the allocation of portfolios, but retains the post of Minister of Defence himself. Louis le Grange becomes Minister of Public Works and Tourism. A new post of Deputy Minister for Defence and National Security is created, and the MP for Bloemfontein West and Chairman of the National Party defence group in Parliament, HI. Kobie’ Coetzee is appointed to it.
11 October, At a special meeting of the General Assembly, the United Nations gave awards to the following seven persons in recognition of their contribution, in cooperation with the United Nations, to the international campaign against apartheid:
The Reverend Canon L. John Collins (United Kingdom)
Michael Manley (Jamaica)
The late General Murtala Mohamed (Nigeria)
The late Gamal Abdel Nasser (Egypt)
The late Jawaharlal Nehru (India)
Olof Palme (Sweden)
The late Paul Robeson (United States of America)
11 October, At a special meeting of the General Assembly , the United Nations gave awards to the following seven persons in recognition of their contribution, in cooperation with the United Nations, to the international campaign against apartheid:
The Reverend Canon L. John Collins
Michael Manley
The late Murtala Mohamed
The late Gamal Abdel Nasser
The late Jawaharlal Nehru
Olof Palme
The late Paul Robeson
26 October, A report drawn up by the Progressive Federal Party calls for power-sharing among all the races in the country, under a federal constitution, providing for political rights without the danger of majority domination. Elections would be on the basis of proportional representation.
The Nederduitse Gereformeerde Kerk (NGK) unanimously rejects proposals for a merger with its three sister churches in the African, Coloured and Indian communities. The policy of different churches for the different peoples is reaffirmed.
31 October, A full scale police search, headed by a specially trained anti-terrorist unit is launched following a shoot-out between police and suspected nationalist guerrillas some forty miles west of Louis Trichardt, Northern Transvaal.
2 November, Justice Anton Mostert, Chairman of a one-man Commission of Inquiry into exchange control contraventions (set up in December 1977) discloses evidence of corruption and the misappropriation of public funds, taken during his investigations into the Information scandal. This improper application of taxpayers money involves, among other things, the financing of the newspaper ‘The Citizen’. Judge Mostert publishes some of the evidence despite a request from P.W. Botha not to do so.
3 November, The Prime Minister appoints a judicial commission to investigate the allegations of corruption. Its three members, Justice R.P. Erasmus of the Orange Free State Division of the Supreme Court, A.J. Lategan, the Cape Attorney-General and G.F. Smallberger the Chief State Law Adviser will present findings to a Special Session of Parliament.
6 November, The Commission begins its investigation into any misappropriation of funds by the former Information Department and into any irregularities of private benefit to individuals that may have occurred. Judge Erasmus decides to hear all evidence in camera.
7 November, Dr. Connie Mulder resigns from the Cabinet, but retains his seat as a Member of Parliament.
The Prime Minister announces that Judge Mostert’s Commission of Inquiry into exchange control contraventions has been terminated and replaced by a twelve-man Parliamentary Commission with the same instructions as that of the Judge. This termination arouses widespread anger.
8 November, Britain announces a probe into allegations that the West Indian island of Antigua has been used in illegal arms traffic to South Africa.
11 November, Dr. Connie Mulder resigns from his post as leader of the National Party in the Transvaal.
14 November, Prime Minister Botha announces an important Cabinet reshuffle, involving the promotion of moderate (‘verligte’) members, the most dramatic of which is the appointment of Dr. Piet Koornhof as Minister of Plural Relations.
15 November, John Vorster, State President and former Prime Minister, appears before the Erasmus Commission.
17 November, Prime Minister Botha gives evidence before the Erasmus Commission, at his own request.
17 November, Blacks (Urban Areas) Amendment Act No 97:
Introduced a ninety-nine-year leasehold system. Full ownership was not attainable until 1986.
Repealed by 17 of the Abolition of Racially Based Land Measures Act No 108 of 1991.
18 November, Minister of Justice, J.T. Kruger, says the PAC has launched two insurgency campaigns Homecoming and Curtain Raiser against South Africa. The South African police have arrested twenty-three of the insurgents already.
20 November, From this date the Bureau of State Security (BOSS) becomes a full portfolio of National Security under the Prime Minister who is now Prime Minister and Minister of Defence and of National Security.
21 November, The Transvaal National Party leadership election produces a decisive win for Dr. Andries Treurnicht, Deputy Minister of Plural Relations. This is interpreted as a right-wing backlash against recent moves to ‘humanize’ apartheid.
It is announced that all Cabinet Ministers on the boards of newspaper groups are to resign their directorships.
The government decides to disband the Foreign Affairs Association, a front organisation founded by the former Department of Information to project a favourable image of South Africa, and to promote dialogue on both internal and external levels.
24 November, The Southern African Freedom Foundation (SAFF) is exposed as a government front financed out of public funds.
28 November, In his first major speech since his election as Transvaal leader Dr Treurnicht revives the concept of a ‘Colouredstan’ to accommodate South Africa’s one million Coloured people - an idea in direct contravention of the National Party’s current policy of power-sharing.
30 November, 261 are detained.
1 December, Transkei’s first President, Paramount Chief Botha Sigcau, dies from a heart attack. Prime Minister K. Matanzima announces his retirement from active politics, but his preparedness to accept nomination as President.
The government extends the Erasmus Commission’s terms of reference to 30 May 1979.
5 December, The Erasmus Commission presents its report on its investigations into allegations of corruption and misappropriation of funds by the former Department of Information to Parliament. It alleges ineptitude, moral turpitude, malpractice and misappropriation in dealing with funds, It discredits Dr. Connie Mulder, General Hendrik van den Bergh and Dr. Eschel Rboodie and his brother Dr. Deneys Rhoodie, who served as his deputy at the Information Ministry, but exonerates State President Vorster and Prime Minister P.W. Botha. For reasons of state security no details are given of the 160 to 180 secret projects controlled by Dr. Rhoodie.
6 December, South Africa Signs agreement with Japan on fisheries.
7 December, State President Vorster opens the first emergency session of Parliament to be held in peace-time and promises action against anyone found guilty of the mal administration and misappropriation of public funds. His Ministry does not accept collective responsibility for the scandal and will not resign.
8 December, KwaZulu: Education Act No 7:
9 December, Sisulu’s son Zwelakhe married Zodwa Mdladlamba.
19 December, Signs International Sugar Agreement. 1977.
27 December, Thabo Mbeki is elected a member of Politico-Military Strategy Commission (PMSC), to consider new strategies options of the African National Congress. The commission is under the leadership of Oliver Tambo.
29 December, Rev. Hi. Hendrickse is elected leader of the Coloured Labour Party of South Africa at its thirteenth Congress in Bloemfontein. The party declares its support for the banned ANC, and urges universal suffrage in a South African unitary state.
Sisulu's daughter Lindiwe marries Xolile Guma in Swaziland.
Sisulu's son Zwelakhe sentenced to 9 months imprisonment in Thami Mkhanazi trial.
1979 is declared the year of the Spear, a tribute to the unbroken struggle since the Battle of Isandlwana of 1879.
Venda independence.
1979
Education and Training Act No 90:
Repealed the Bantu (Black) Education Act No 47 of 1953 and the Bantu Special Education Act No 24 of 1964.
IN FORCE (as amended by Educators Employment Act No 138 of 1994): EDUCATION.
Births and Deaths Registration Act No 20:
Specified persons who could be registered as Transkeian citizens by birth.
KaNgwane: Public Services Act No 3:
Repealed by 37 of the Public Service Act No 5 of 1989.
KwaZulu: Financial Regulations for Tribal and Community Authorities Act No 7:
1979 - 1990
Commission of Inquiry into Labour Legislation
Mandate: To inquire into, report on and make recommendations in connection with the following matters:
a)Industrial Conciliation Act, 1956
b)Bantu Labour Relations Regulation Act, 1953
c)Wage Act, 1957
d)Factories, Machinery and Building Work Act, 1941
e)Shops and Offices Act, 1964
f)Apprenticeship Act, 1944
g)Training of Artisans Act, 1951
h)Bantu Building Workers Act, 1951
i)Electrical Wiremen and Contractors’ Act, 1939
j)Workmen’s Compensation Act, 1941
k)Unemployment Insurance Act, 1966
l)Registration for Employment Act, 1945
The mandate was extended to include:
m)Mines and Works Act, 1956 or any other act administered by the Department of Mines.
Date of Report: 1979/1990
The report was made in six parts (see separate references below)
Chair: WIEHAHN, N.E.
Ref: Part 1: RP 47-79 (E&A)
Part 2: RP 38-80 (E&A)
Parts 3 & 4: RP 82-80 (E), RP 87-80 (A)
Part 5: RP 27-81(E&A)
Part 6: RP 28-81 (E&A).
Commission of Inquiry into the Riots at Soweto and Elsewhere from 16 June 1976 to 28 February 1977
Mandate: To inquire into and report on the riots at Soweto and other places in the Republic during June 1976, and their causes. Date of Report: 1979
Chair: CILLIÁ‹, P.M.
Ref: RP 55/1980 (E), RP 106/1979 (A)
FOSATU was formally constituted in April with 12 affiliates representing 45 000 workers.
The Wiehahn Commission of Enquiry into labour legislation recommended the legalisation of African trade unions. This led to the government amending the Industrial Conciliation Act to put this recommendation into effect. The Riekert Commission recommended the limited easing of restrictions on the mobility of urban workers.
335 people were charged in terms of Section 16 of the Immorality Act in 1976.
The boycott of Fattis and Monis products in May in support of the Food and Cannings Workers Union was the first consumer boycott since the late fifties.
The number of strikes in 1976, 1977 and 1978 were 245,90 and 160 respectively.
The Soweto Civic Association and the Port Elizabeth Black Civic Organisation are formed.
108 911 families were moved in terms of the Group Areas Act.
The South African Allied Workers Union is formed.
The Education and Training Act is passed to replace the Bantu Education Act of 1953. African education is now under the Department of Education and Training (DET).
The Congress of South African Students (COSAS) forms.
Phyllis and four others were severely injured when Father John Osmers opened a letter bomb addressed to him in her home.
Phyllis works as Chief Legal Aid Counsel for the government of Lesotho.
(edit) African trade unions are for the first time recognised under the Industrial Relations Act. During September the Azanian People’s Organisation holds its inaugural conference. Two months later the Azanian Students Organisation is formed for College students, whilst the Congress of South African Students (COSAS) is formed for high school students. The Western Cape is hit by a wave of stayaways with broad community support focusing on a wide range of issues.
Kaizer Chiefs sign a major sponsorship deal with Premier Milling Company.
8 January, Signs agreement with Lesotho on issuing of notes and coin.
13 January, A clash between police and suspected guerrillas is reported near the Botswana border. Botswana denies that it is being used as a springboard for attacks on his neighbours despite this being the third shooting incident in the Northern Transvaal with the guerrillas apparently coming from Botswana.
The government is reported to have frozen the South African assets of the former Information Secretary, Dr. Eschel Roodie, and to have seized secret funds deposited in private accounts outside the country.
24 January, The former Minister of Information, Dr. Connie Mulder, resigns his seat in parliament at the insistence of the Prime Minister, P.W. Botha. Announcing his decision, Dr. Mulder claims that his conscience is clear and decisions made were in the interests of the country.
The Transvaal Attorney-General, Jan Nothling, states that General Hendrick van den Bergh, former head of BOSS, will not be prosecuted for disparaging remarks made about the Erasmus Commission, since this would involve the publication of evidence, not in the national interest. This decision is strongly criticized by the opposition parties.
2 February, Opening Parliament, State President Vorster promises South Africa a new deal, new economic and financial measures and a new constitutional dispensation.
5 February, The official opposition Progressive Federal Party refuses to congratulate John Vorster on his appointment as State President on the grounds that not all the evidence of the Erasmus Commission has been made public. PFP leader Cohn Eglin describes the real tragedy of the information scandal as the immobilization of government and the diversion of attention away from the real problems facing the country.
6 February, In reply to the opposition’s motion Prime Minister P.W. Botha offers to resign if opposition politicians can show that either he or his cabinet were aware of the information scandal.
7 February, Figures released by the South African Institute of Race Relations indicate a fall of twenty per cent in political trials in 1978, compared with 1977. Authorities are showing increasing recourse to preventive detention rather than administrative banning of opponents.
19 February, The former Transkei Prime Minister, Chief Kaiser Matanzima, is elected President of Transkei. His brother, Chief George Matanzima, is elected leader of the ruling Transkei Congress Party (TCP).
21 February, George Matanzima becomes Premier.
26 February, Mozambique and South Africa sign a railway cooperation agreement.
March, Thabo Mbeki gives recommendations to the Politico-Military Strategy Commission that political cause should be followed rather than the military ones. Thabo is in favour of negotiating with the South African government.
4 March, In reaction to newspaper reports, Prime Minister P.W. Botha states through the media, that he will not be ‘blackmailed into a deal with anybody’ and challenges Dr. Rhoodie to return to South Africa.
Iran breaks off diplomatic, political, economic and military ties with South Africa, and will no longer supply oil to this country.
6 March, The trial of eighteen suspected PAC members which began in December 1977 and has already taken over 100 court sessions, resumes in Bethal. The defendants face two main charges under the Terrorism Act, and a number of alternative counts under other legislation.
6 March - 7 March, General Hendrik van den Bergh has a lengthy meeting with Dr. E. Rhoodie in Paris and indicates afterwards that it has been agreed that Dr. Rhoodie will not divulge details of his tapes to the media.
8 March, Foreign Minister ‘Pik’ Botha, says in Switzerland that South Africa will consider adopting a more neutral position in world affairs and become pro-African rather than pro-Western.
9 March, The government gives official notice that it has refused to allow the Herstigte Nasionale Party to he registered as a political party, in terms of an amendment to the Electoral Act made in 1978. The party’s leader, Jaap Marais, indicates that the party will continue to put up candidates for election, hut as independents.
9 March, Republic of Bophuthatswana Constitution Further Amendment Act No 21:
Provided for the detention of individuals ‘in the interests of national security or public safety.
14 March, On his return from Paris, General Hendrik van den Bergh has his own passport impounded on orders from the Minister of the Interior, and the Prime Minister makes it clear that the General had no government authority to negotiate with Dr. Rhoodie.
15 March, Four people, believed to be members of the ANC, are arrested in Gaborone, Botswana, and charged with the illegal possession of explosives and firearms. They receive sentences of from two to four-and-a-half years imprisonment.
15 March, Dr. Rhoodie reiterates that he possesses documentary evidence of secret projects involving the transfer of funds to major political figures in several Western countries. He denies being guilty of any criminal offence.
16 March, A warrant is issued for Dr. Rhoodie’s arrest on a charge of fraud, with an alternative charge of theft.
The terms of reference of the Erasmus Commission are extended to investigate and evaluate, by 31 March 1979, the government’s political culpability. The Prime Minister also authorizes that appointment, from 1 June 1979, of an Advocate-General who will investigate and report to Parliament on any allegation, supported by a sworn affidavit, of corruption on malpractices by the government.
17 March, It is reported that during February 1979, Dr. Eschel Rhoodie has claimed in interviews in Quito, Ecador, that he was the initiator of the South African government’s policy of detente conducted in 1974-76. He subsequently threatens to release forty-one tape recordings containing details of secret South African propaganda and security operations.
18 March, The government admits responsibility for the death of the black leader, Joseph Mdluli on 19 March 1976 and agree to pay damages to his family. A claim for loss of support, against the Minister of Justice and Police, will be settled out of court.
20 March, Former South African Supreme Court judge, Judge J.F. Ludorf, claims he has evidence that two hired German killers were paid to murder the former South African representative to the International Monetary Fund, Dr. Robert Smit and his wife. The Prime Minister’s office states that there is no connection between the Smit murders and irregularities in the former Information Department, but speculation continues.
22 March, President Vorster, in a lengthy statement, challenges Dr. Rhoodie to release any document which may implicate him in the Information affair; emphasizes that the question is not whether state money has been available for secret projects, but whether that money has been misused; denies he was informed of the secret funding of ‘The Citizen’ and rejects as contemptible Dr. Rhoodie’s attempt to drag Minister Horwood into the affair.
The Prime Minister, in a cautiously worded statement issued by his office, says the Cabinet knew of secret projects, but not about the state funding of ‘The Citizen’, or of irregularities that have taken place. He says he has undertaken to resign only if it can be proved that members of his Cabinet were aware of one specific project - the funding of The Citizen - before he came into power in September 1978.
President Vorster’s statement is immediately followed by calls for his resignation by the opposition parties on the grounds that he has violated the fundamental constitutional principle that the State President acts in political matters only on the advice of his Cabinet, and that he has pronounced on evidence material to the Erasmus Commission.
23 March, The Prime Minister defends John Vorster’s statement, denying that a constitutional crisis has been created.
The two major opposition parties demand the immediate resignation of President Vorster because of his intervention in the Information scandal, which is said to have created a major constitutional crisis.
25 March, Dr. Connie Mulder, in effect, accuses President Vorster of lying and states that the decision to found and finance ‘The Citizen’ was known to him from the start. He provides precise dates and times of meetings concerning the Information Department’s secret projects, from 23 October 1974 onwards, held in the Prime Minister’s office.
26 March, The opposition moves to impeach President Vorster for his controversial intervention. However it requires the signature of thirty Members of Parliament to convene a special debate and the opposition parties can only Convene twenty-seven votes.
28 March, It is disclosed that summaries of Dr. Rhoodie’s tape recordings have already been made available to a syndicate including the British Broadcasting Corporation and the United States National Broadcasting Corporation.
28 March, The World Campaign against Military and Nuclear Collaboration with South Africa was launched in London, with the support of the UN Special Committee against Apartheid. Several Heads of State and Government were its patrons and Abdul S. Minty its Director.
30 March, The draft Constitution is published. It is widely criticized and the government decides not to introduce it in the current Parliamentary session. Instead it is now submitted to a Parliamentary Select Committee.
The Foreign Minister ‘Pik’ Botha, whose portfolio now includes the South African Information Services, promises to give opposition leaders full access to all current secret projects. He has decided to terminate, with effect from 1 April 1979, all confidential and sensitive projects that do not serve the national interests in the most effective manner.
1 April, Gazankulu: Black Administration Amendment Act No 4:
1 April, Gazankulu: Criminal Procedure Amendment Act No 7:
2 April, In an interim report, the Erasmus Commission exonerates P.W. Botha and all members at’ his government from having had any prior knowledge of irregularities in the former Department of Information. The Commission’s findings are the result of a special two-week inquiry, focussing on whether members of the Cabinet knew of the funding of ‘The Citizen’ before 26 September 1978.
4 April, Dr. Andries Treurnicht, the leader of the National Party in the Transvaal, gives Dr. Connie Mulder an ultimatum to accept the findings of the Erasmus Commission by noon on 5 April 1979, failing which he will be expelled from the party. Dr. Mulder states he cannot accept the report.
5 April, The White Paper on Defence warns that the military threat against South Africa is intensifying at an alarming rate. A total national security strategy is being developed to counter the ‘total onslaught’. This involves a major increase in naval defence spending, the overhaul of the air defence system and the creation of a parachute brigade.
6 April, Solomon Mahlangu is hanged in Pretoria.
6 April, Dr. Connie Mulder is expelled from the National Party over his role in the Information Department scandal.
9 April, The Botswana government is building a camp to house over 5,000 student refugees from South Africa at Molepolole, thirty-five km. west of Gaborone. This will be a country settlement and not a training camp.
Signs agreement with Portugal on mutual fishery relations,
11 April, The home of the leader of the opposition Progressive Federal Party, Cohn Eglin, is attacked. The attack follows a pattern characteristic of the secret society known as ‘Scorpio’.
12 April, Prime Minister, P.W. Botha, announces that three members of the staff of the United States Embassy in South Africa, have been given a week to leave the country. They have photographed sensitive military installations by a secret camera installed in a diplomatic aircraft.
19 April, In a major policy statement, the Prime Minister declares that in future, South Africa will be guided solely by its own interests, and those of the Southern African region.
The American government has supplied no reasonable explanation or apology for the photographing of the uranium enrichment Pehindaba plant. Instead they have acted against two South African attaches in the United States.
The International Press Institute (IPI) appoints an official observer in South Africa, Joel Mervis, to report on matters affecting the conduct and freedom of the press. He will observe court actions and Press Council complaints brought against editors, journalists and publishers, and their outcome.
20 April, The Federation of South African Trade Unions (FOSATU) is founded. It aims to be a national, non-racial, umbrella body co-ordinating South Africa’s black trade union movements.
26 April, Dr. Connie Mulder refused to give evidence before the Erasmus Commission, alleging it has declined to grant him a fair hearing.
27 April, Internal Security Act No 32:
Empowered Government to declare an organisation unlawful and to control the distribution of publications. Meetings of more than twenty persons were declared unlawful unless authorised by the magistrate. This Act repealed the whole of the 1950 Internal Security Act [SA] and related Acts, with the exception of the 1960 Unlawful Organisations Act which declared that any organisation which threatened public safety was unlawful. Included in this category were the ANC and the PAC (SRR 1979: 312).
Sections 27-9 inclusive repealed by the State of Emergency Act No 86 of 1995 [SA]
1 May, The first interim report of the Wiehahn Commission is tabled in Parliament. its recommendations include registration of black trade unions, including migrant workers, abolition of the principle of statutory job reservation; retention of the closed shop; the creation of a National Manpower Commission and an Industrial Court to resolve industrial litigation. The report is welcomed in trade union and business circles.
2 May, The Minister for Cooperation and Development, Dr. Piet Koornbof, announces that relevant urban black leaders will be consulted about the position of blacks outside the ‘homelands’. His deputy, Dr. Willie Vosloo, announces the reversal of the government’s policy on Alexandra Township: it will be renewed with the emphasis on high-density family housing rather than hostels.
The Minister of Labour, S.P. Botha, says that the government accepts the Wiehahn Report in principle, but some of its recommendations will have to be implemented with caution and care.
4 May, In its final report the Erasmus Commission amends its interim report and states that President Vorster has to bear joint responsibility for continued irregularities in the former Department of Information while he was in office as Prime Minister. It exonerates P.W. Botha and the Minister of Finance, Senator Owen Horwood.
B.J. Vorster resigns from his position as State President. Marais Viljoen, the President of the Senate, is sworn in as acting State President.
8 May, The recommendations of the Riekert Commission are tabled. These include more black involvement in government administration boards; active promotion of home ownership; wider opportunities for black traders in white areas; dismantling of the Department of Plural Relations; streamlining of recruitment procedures in ‘homelands’; curfew on blacks in white areas to be lifted; scrapping of random pass arrests.
11 May, Eleven Soweto school pupil leaders are convicted of sedition and sentenced in Johannesburg to terms of imprisonment, most of which are suspended, since the accused have already been held for long periods. The charges arise from the June 1976 demonstrations.
The executive of the South African Confederation of Labour (SACL) approves the government’s White Paper accepting the Wiehahn Report by thirteen voters to eleven.
17 May, The Advocate General Bill is introduced by L. Muller, Minister of Transport, against strong opposition from the Progressive Federal Party and the New Republic Party. The Bill, resulting from the Information Department scandal, will prevent anyone publishing or broadcasting material relating to the alleged misappropriation of state funds without the written permission of an Advocate General who will be specially appointed. The holding of inquiries by the Advocate General will be secret. This ‘totalitarian measure’ and ‘press gag’ is widely condemned.
21 May, Signs multilateral treaty pertaining to the South East Atlantic fisheries agreement on the total catch quota of hake in 1979.
30 May, Following fierce opposition to the Advocate General’s Bill, the government refers it to a Parliamentary Select Committee - on which it will have an overwhelming majority. The official opposition series of amendments have little chance of success.
June, David Sibeko assassinated.
June, The Congress of South Africon Students (COSAS) is formed.
1 June, KwaZulu: Criminal Procedure Act No 14:
6 June, In the by-election at Randfontein (formerly Dr. C. Mulder’s seat) the National Party candidate wins, but with a very much reduced majority over the Herstigte Nasionale Party.
7 June, S.P. Botha introduces the second reading of the Industrial Conciliation Amendment Bill, under which a national manpower commission is to he set up, the registration of trade unions and employers’ organisations is to be regulated and safeguards against inter-racial competition are to be repealed, except in certain industries. The Bill is opposed by the PFP and by various trade unions, including the multiracial Trade Union Council of South Africa.
8 June, State Land Disposal Act No 23: Set out mechanisms for the disposal of state land.
12 June, A member of the three-man Presidential Council of the PAC, David M. Sibeko, dies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, after being shot the previous night. Mr. Sibeko was Director of the PAC’s Foreign Affairs and formerly PAC representative at the United Nations in New York. His assassination shocks political exiles.
13 June, Marais Viljoen, former President of the Senate and acting State President, is elected State President by members of both Houses of Parliament and is sworn in on 19 June 1979.
14 June, An amendment to the Inquest Act prevents any reporting on a suspicious death before an inquest. Its intention is to discourage publicity surrounding deaths in detention. in the same week amendments are gazetted to the Police Act curbing the reporting of allegations of brutality and maladministration in the Police Force.
Cabinet changes are announced by Prime Minister, P.W. Botha.
Botswana authorities announce the arrests in Gaborone of nine black dissidents in connection with the assassination of Mr. Sibeko.
In the face of widespread protest the Prime Minister announces that provisions in the Advocate General Bill preventing the press from publishing details of the misuse of government funds, without the permission of a government official, have been dropped for the present.
16 June, Six PAC members, all from Itumbi Camp, Southern Tanzania, appear before a magistrate’s court in Dar es Salaam, charged with the murder of PAC leader, David Sibeko.
17 June, The government’s White Paper on the Riekert Commission rejects two crucial recommendations - that employers of illegal labour, and not workers, be prosecuted, and that the 72-hour time limit for ‘illegal’ blacks in prescribed areas be abolished.
19 June, JT. Kruger, formerly Minister of Justice, Police and Prisons, is elected President of the Senate on the nomination of P.W. Botha.
20 June, The government’s White Paper on the Riekert Report accepts that existing laws enforcing racial separation may have to be reviewed and that greater mobility of urban blacks between different urban areas is desirable. However, certain restrictions will remain in force.
21 June, The Information Service of South Africa Special Account Bill is passed against the votes of the opposition parties. Under it, the unauthorized expenditure by the former Department of Information is accepted as a statutory accomplished fact.
22 June, The Advocate-General Bill is passed in amended form against PFP opposition.
Signs amendment to multilateral treaty on endangered species of flora and fauna.
26 June, South Africa’s longest political trial ends in Bethal, Transvaal with seventeen defendents sharing a total of 147 years’ imprisonment. They were charged under the Terrorism Act with reviving the banned PAC, sending people out of South Africa for insurgency training and inciting riots in Kagiso township in June 1976.
26 June, Mr. Zeph Mothopeng and 16 others were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment on charges of reviving the PAC and sending people outside the country for military training.
28 June, Dr. C. Mulder, together with two other former National Party members, Cas Greyling and Sarel Reinecke, and four other men announce the formation of an Action Front for National Priorities with the aim of forming a new right-wing party whose ideological position would lie between those of the National Party and the Herstigte Nasionale Party.
16 July, The Secretary of Health announces that all senior doctors in the Public Service, irrespective of race, will in future receive equal salaries.
19 July, Dr. E. Rhoodie is arrested at the French Riviera resort Juan les Pins. He will appear in Aix-en-Provence for extradition proceedings on 31 July 1979, following the receipt of extradition documents from South Africa.
26 July, The annual conference of the South African Council of Churches decides that some restrictions on interracial contact in South Africa are so objectionable that they cannot be obeyed with a clear conscience.
The Schlebush Commission investigating a future constitution for South Africa, meets for the first time. The Chairman, A.L. Schlebusch, Minister of Justice and of the Interior, says that the Commission views the government’s previous constitutional proposals as merely one of the sets of proposals under consideration, that be is happy to hear evidence from blacks, and that the commission will hold most of its hearings in public.
29 July, The government is reported to have paid the family of the Black Consciousness leader, Steve Biko, R65,000 in settlement of claims for his death in custody in 1977. The Minister of Police, Louis le Grange, says the state is not admitting liability and the file on the Biko affair has now been closed.
3 August, Police Act No 16:
Granted the police further powers with regard to search and seizure. 
7 August, The Prime Minister, P.W. Botha, draws up a comprehensive national strategy, reappraising the apartheid policy and reiterating his aim of establishing a constellation of independent African states.
13 August, The leader of two independent ‘homelands’. Chief K. Matanzima and President Mangope of Bophuthatswana, support Mr. Botha’s call for a constellation of states.
15 August, Addressing the National Party’s Natal Provincial Congress in Durban, the Prime Minister puts forward a twelve-point plan for achieving a permanent solution to the country’s multi-racial problems.
22 August, Dr. Eschel Rboodie is extradited from France and handed over to the South African authorities. He appears briefly in Pretoria’s Supreme Court charged with fraud and theft.
29 August, The National Party wins two uncertain victories in by-elections, with sharply reduced majorities in both seats.
30 August, Dr. Connie Mulder is acquitted and discharged on charges of contempt by the Pretoria Supreme Court. Justice W.G. Boshoff rules that there is no evidence that the questions Dr. Mulder has been called to answer before the Erasmus Commission, had any relevance to the Commission’s mandate at that time.
31 August, P.W. Botha becomes the first South African Prime Minister to visit Soweto. His visit includes talks with the Soweto Community Council during which he promises that Soweto debts, totalling some R9m. will be written off.
September, The inaugural conference of Azapo is held.
3 September, Dr. Frederick van Zyl Slabbert is chosen as the Leader of the Opposition Progressive Federal Party (PFP) in succession to Cohn Eghin, who is elected the party’s National Chairman.
6 September, The Minister of Cooperation and Development, ‘Piet’ Koornhof, says that blacks in urban areas will not have political rights in the white political system but only in the ‘homelands’.
12 September, South Africa’s new Ambassador to the United Nations, Adrian Eksteen, presents his credentials to the Secretary-General, Dr. Kurt Waldheim.
12 September - 13 September, At midnight the Republic of Venda becomes independent. Chief Mphephu will become Venda’s first President.
13 September, South Africa proclaimed the “independence“ of the bantustan of Venda.
Republic of Venda Constitution Act No 9: Provided for a Venda Constitution.
Venda becomes an independent homeland.
19 September, The Chairman of the Commission of Inquiry into Consolidation of the ‘Homelands’, Hennie van der Walt, speaking at the National Party’s Transvaal Congress, states that the proposals for redistribution of land will go beyond the provisions of the 1936 Land Act, hitherto regarded by the government as immutable.
21 September, The United Nations Security Council condemns the establishment of Venda as totally invalid.
25 September, The Minister of Manpower Utilisation, Fanie Botha, tells the Conference of the Federated Chamber of Industries that migrant workers from the ‘homelands’ are to be allowed to join registered black trade unions. An announcement is gazetted on 28 September 1979.
26 September, The Prime Minister tells the Cape Congress of the National Party that he is prepared to consider constructive suggestions for revision of the section of the Immorality Act which forbids miscegenation and of the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act.
27 September, The Minister of Community Development, Marais Steyn, announces that restaurants may open to all races without having to apply for special permits.
30 September, AZAPO elects new leaders at its first Congress, near Johannesburg. The 200 delegates choose as leader, Curtis Nkondo, a former Soweto teacher who resigned in protest against the separate school system for blacks. AZAPO declares itself opposed to all institutions created by the government and to the principle of ethnically-based institutions and advocates the creation of a single Parliamentary state.
1 October, Industrial Conciliation Amendment Act No 94:
Permitted certain blacks, excluded under the 1953 Act, to join unions. However, the exclusion of migrant workers and frontier commuters remained in force until it was lifted in the Government Gazette No 6679 of 28 September 1979 (SRR 1979: 285). This Act prohibited the existence of mixed trade unions (SRR 1979: 281) and repealed s 77 of the 1956 Act (see above) regarding job reservation (SRR 1979: 
Repealed by the Labour Relations Act No 66 of 1995.
2 October, The South African Barbarians rugby team completes its controversial tour of Britain with minimal disruption but against a background of condemnation from African and Commonwealth countries.
3 October, The results of four Parliamentary by-elections show a decided swing to the Herstigte Nasionale Party and low percentage polls. The National Party retains its seats, but by very reduced majorities.
8 October, Dr. Eschel Rhoodie is found guilty on five of seven charges of fraud or theft involving R63,000 of secret government funds and sentenced to six years imprisonment. He is granted bail the following day.
10 October, The PAC appoints V. Make as its new chairman and H. Isaacs to replace the assassinated Mr. Sibeko as its Director of Foreign Affairs.
26 October, The General Assembly requested the Secretary-General to conduct an investigation into reports concerning a nuclear explosion by South Africa in the area of the Indian Ocean and the South Atlantic on 22 September.
November - December, Black workers in the motor industry are involved in strike action in connection with demands for recognition by independent black trade unions.
November, The Azanian Students Organisation (AZASO) is formed.
1 November, Accepts Article VII of General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.
2 November, The government announces a plan to allow white and black businessmen to form partnerships as part of a strategy to draw blacks into free enterprise.
7 November, Signs amendment to a multilateral treaty on plant protection.
The former Information Minister, Dr. Connie Mulder is elected leader of the newly-formed National Conservative Party.
The National Party loses its Edenvale, Johannesburg seat to the PFP, its first by-election defeat since it came to power in 1948. In three other disputed constituencies - Durbanville, Worcester and Eshowe - the National Party retains its seats but with reduced majorities.
9 November, A meeting between the Prime Minister, P.W. Botha and Coloured leaders for preliminary discussion on the constitutional future of the Coloured people ends in deadlock. The Labour Party leaders refuse to give evidence before the all-white Schlebusch Constitutional Commission.
12 November, The Minister for Coloured Relations, S.J.M. Steyn, states that no elections are planned after the current five-year term of the elected Coloured Representative Council (CRC) expires on 31 March 1980. He indicates that the CRC may be replaced by a nominated interim council, pending new constitutional arrangements.
15 November, The trial of twelve members of the banned ANC in Pietermaritzburg ends with the death sentence for one defendant and a total of 173 years’ imprisonment for the others. Following an international campaign for clemency, the death sentence on James Mange is overruled by the Bloemfontein Appeal Court, on 11 September 1980, and he is sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment.
22 November, The Prime Minister, P.W. Botha, outlines a project for a constellation of states to some 250 leading businessmen. Its objective would be to improve the lives of all peoples in the Southern African region.
Signs multilateral GAIT protocol supplementary to Geneva 1979 protocol.
30 November, 334 people were detained.
5 December, The Prime Minister announces the appointment of a Commission of Inquiry into the reporting of defence matters, to be headed by Justice MT. Steyn. The Commission is to inquire into and make recommendations on the dividing line between the rights of the media to inform and the right of the public to be informed on the one hand, and the interests of the security of the state on the other.
5 December, South Africa was expelled from the annual General Conference of the International Atomic Energy Agency, meeting in New Delhi.
5 December, South Africa was expelled from the annual conference of the International Atomic Energy Agency meeting in New Delh6 December, The Prime Minister announces a reorganisation of the governmental administrative structure, under which the number of central executive institutions is to be reduced from thirty-nine to twenty-two, with responsibilities being distributed between eighteen ministries.
10 December, The government relaxes the Group Areas Act permit system on a wide range of shared facilities.
The Minister of Community Development announces that blacks will in future be admitted to certain amenities previously reserved for whites, including libraries, private hospitals, restaurants, theatres, concerts, exhibitions, and drive-in cinemas.
11 December, Alexandre Moumbaris, who was serving a twelve-year sentence, convicted under the Terrorism Act, escapes from Pretoria Central, and succeeds in reaching Zambia. Two white academics from the University of Cape Town, escape with him.
12 December, Signs agreement with Lesotho on the issue and use of a road camp site on Cobham State Forest.
14 December, KwaZulu: Black Authorities Amendment Act No 6:
18 December, Signs multilateral treaty on import and licensing procedure (GAIT).
Signs multilateral treaty relating to bovine meat (GATT).
24 December, The Security Police detains the President and six Executive Members of the recently formed Congress of South African Students (COSAS).
29 December, South Africa Signs multilateral treaty on dairy arrangements (GAIT).

Collections in the Archives

General South African History Timeline: 1970s
General South African History Timeline: 1900s