Forming the Federation

From the book: My Spirit Is Not Banned by Frances Baard and Barbie Schreiner

'The battle for democracy and liberation can only be won when women, mothers of the nation - a half of the whole population - can take their rightful place as free and equal partners with men.'

From the invitation to the 1954 'Women's Conference

From the time I joined .the ANC we spent a long time organizing the women. When I joined there were only a few women there but after we began-to organize ”” shjoo! ”” Soon many women were organized.

In the early fifties, the government decided to make black women carry passes as well. Up to then the women didn't have to carry passes, only the men,' but now they wanted to make us carry passes as well. Well lots of things happened then because the women didn't want these passes.

A pass is this little book that you must get when you are 16 and it says where you can work, and where you can be, and if you have got work. You can't get a job without this book. And you can only get a job where they stamp your pass to say 'Johannesburg' or 'Pretoria' and so on. You must carry it with you all the time because the police can ask you, 'Where is your pass?' any time, and then you must show them. If you haven't got your pass, even if it is just at home, then they won't let you go and fetch it, they put you in jail for some days or else you must pay some money to get out.

In 1953 Ray Alexander came to Port Elizabeth, and while she was there she wanted to have a meeting with the women. Florence and I helped to organize the meeting quickly for that same night. We told many women and each one told another one that there would be a meeting. There were about 40 or 50 women at the meeting. We were talking about the position of women, and what we could do, and we were talking about passes, food prices, rent and so on. At that time they wanted to start influx control for women in Port Elizabeth so the women were very worried what would happen to them. We were very worried about all these things that were happening against women. At that meeting a woman suggested that we should have a conference to set up a national organization of women. We knew that we would be much stronger if we could all work together. We all thought that it was a very good idea and we decided that Ray must start to organize such a thing.

So she organized the conference, and Hilda Watts in Johannesburg helped a lot, and some other women too. In the beginning of 1954 we all got invitations to go to a conference of women in Johannesburg. I was one of the women who signed that invitation.

In April many women from all over South Africa came together in Johannesburg to talk to each other. The women from the ANC, the Congress of Democrats, the Indian Congress (which has now been revived) and the Coloured People's Congress, and the women from the trade unions all came to Johannesburg for that meeting, about 150 women. There were women of all races there even though most of the women were African.

A group of us went from the Eastern Cape to Johannesburg, from Port Elizabeth and East London. We went by car. Mrs. Njongwe (she was the wife of one of our leaders) drove the car all the way from East London. It was a very long way for a woman to drive in that time.

We were late to arrive at the conference because the car broke down on the way. Hawu! We were so scared we should not get there. When we got to the hall there was somebody speaking, but we were so glad to be there we just walked into the hall to join all the women. There were four or five or six of us, I don't remember now, all in our Eastern Cape dress, long ochre skirts and headdresses, and that whole conference stopped. We stopped that whole conference and they turned to look at us, such a group, looking so good.

It was a very exciting conference. We felt very strong with all the women coming together. We felt very proud that we were all together. It was very important that the women were following us. When the people are behind you, then you can do a lot of things.

We spoke at that conference about women and their problems -and how we can organize to change things. Some people gave speeches, Ida Mtwana and, some others, and we all spoke our problems and ideas. I told the women at that conference about the passes in Port Elizabeth, and how the women didn't want them.

I remember Lillian [Ngoyi] stood up and she said that there would have been many more women there but their husbands didn't want them to go. The husbands say they want democracy, but then they won't let their wives go to meetings.

My friend Florence Matomela was there too from Port Elizabeth and she also speaking. It was getting late and there was a lot to do, so the chairwoman said, 'Time is getting short; each speaker is only allowed three minutes.'

When Florence was talking the chairwoman reminded her that she could only talk for three minutes, and Florence - she was a big woman - she stood there and she folded her arms, and she said, 'I am a defiers', meaning that she had been a volunteer in the Defiance Campaign; 'I am a defiers, and I shall speak for as long as I like!'

And she did! And she said that the conference would bring tears to Dr Malan, because he did not want the women to-be united. She said. 'We want to go to war with Malan. We have no guns for our war, but we shall fight till he gives in.'

While we were having our meetings at that conference, and talking about this and this, there were some men looking after the tea and food and everything so we didn't have to waste time with that. I think it was the men from the Indian Youth Congress. They served us with tea and everything while we had our meeting!

At that conference we adopted the Women's Charter, which says all the things that we women believe and our aims. We said that women should be equal with men, and there should be maternity homes and proper hospitals for women and their children. We want proper houses, and we want all the laws that stop one working anywhere and living anywhere taken away. And we said that women must work and organize so we can get all the things we want. There were many things that we wanted. When everybody had spoken at this conference and we had discussed things, we decided that we must form a national organization for women and we decided to call it the Federation of South African Women. The Federation was made up of all the organizations that were at the conference: the ANC Women's League, the Congress of Democrats, the South African Indian Congress and the Coloured People's Organization. You couldn't join the Federation as an individual; you had to be a member of one of those organizations and then you were automatically a member of the Federation.

We elected a committee for the Federation and Ida Mtwana was elected as our first president. She was the president of the Transvaal Women's League. Florence Matomela was one of the vice-presidents with Lillian Ngoyi and some others, and I was elected onto the committee too.

We talked a lot about the pass laws at that conference and everyone was saying that they are a bad thing, and the first thing the Federation must do is to fight these laws. We must organize the women to fight them.