Reggie Williams

Apartheid was a programme established by the white dominated National Party (NP) in 1948 to consolidate the process of racial segregation in South Africa. The apartheid state prided itself on being an economic power globally. However, the discriminatory laws and senseless murders of thousands of innocent non-whites in South Africa attracted unwanted international attention that hindered their progress to becoming an even larger economic power in the world economy.

The international movement for sanctions against South Africa was initiated at the All-African Peoples’ Conference in Accra, Ghana 1958. The conference called for every country that has economic relations with South Africa to halt them and divest from the country due to the country’s racial policies at the time. At the same conference, the African National Congress (ANC) also called for the nationwide boycott of all businesses led by the Nationalists (NP supporters). Many countries started boycotting South African products, forcing the United Nations (UN) to call for sanctions against South Africa. 

In 1959, a boycott movement was launched in Britain, mostly by South African political exiles. This was known as the Boycott Campaign. The Boycott Movement successfully established a month-long boycott against South African goods in March 1960. Soon, other countries followed suit and launched their boycott movements, including Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway. Questions remained as to whether the world's biggest economy would also follow the lead. The inclusion of the United States of America (USA) in boycotting South African products became a testament to the international effort and reaction in opposition to the NP in South Africa. The United States Government were urged by a number of organisations to stop buying raw materials from South Africa unless there were no alternative available traders; called for consumers to boycott South African-produced goods; and urged those working in the docks to refrain from unloading South African goods from ships. These were all a result of the liberation movement gaining pace in South Africa. Events such as the Sharpeville Massacre and the State of Emergency further pushed countries to call for embargos and sanctions against the South African state. 

While we know a lot about the countries that played an international role in the anti-apartheid struggle, much less is known about individual actors who often pushed these countries to get involved. Reggie Williams is one such individual who has been covered by the dust of the sandstorm of events that occurred in South Africa during economic sanctions and boycotts. Reggie Williams’ influence in the divestments from South Africa happened at a much later stage than some of the abovementioned events. However, it was still part of the ongoing anti-apartheid struggle. 

Reggie Williams was born on 19 September 1954 in Flint, Michigan (USA). During his childhood, he was exposed to the inequalities that took place in American society, and he was part of civil rights marches throughout his childhood. His passion for civil rights was further ignited when he heard Dr Martin Luther King Jr speaking in Michigan a year before he was assassinated. His struggles as a black individual growing up in America shared relations to the struggles that millions of black people were facing halfway across the world in South Africa. While in school, he was quite active in sports as an American footballer and a wrestler. It is in the former sport that he became extremely successful. Reggie graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in psychology in 1976 (the same year of the Soweto Uprising). Seeing Hector Petersen’s body being carried left a lasting impact on him and prompted him to take action at a later point in his life. In 1976, he also made his debut in the NFL. He is arguably one of the most productive franchise players the NFL has ever seen. He took the Cincinnati Bengals to two Super Bowls. Despite their losses, reaching the Super Bowl is no small feat. His career at the Cincinnati Bengals spanned 14 seasons, with him eventually retiring in 1989. Despite his on-field success, he was also very successful off the field, and it is here that he made a meaningful impact. In 1985, he won the Byron White Award for Humanitarian Service; in 1986, he was named the NFL Man of the Year; in 1987, he was named Co-Sportsman of the Year by Sports Illustrated. He was also a College Football Hall of Famer and received an Honorary Doctor of Law from Dartmouth College in 1990. He became a Cincinnati City Councilman in his last two years playing for the Cincinnati Bengals in 1988. He was a councilman for three years. 

Reggie Williams in the NFL. Getty Images.

While serving as a councilman, he befriended a tennis player and three-time Grand Slam winner, Arthur Ashe. Arthur became involved in the anti-apartheid struggle after being repeatedly rejected for a visa to South Africa despite being the number 1-ranked tennis player in the US. He created the Artists and Athletes Against Apartheid organisation, which raised awareness about South African racial policies and called for urgent sanctions and embargoes to be placed against South Africa. He also boycotted all tennis events in South Africa. Befriending Arthur was no surprise, given their political involvement and longing for social justice. Arthur introduced Reggie to the idea of anti-apartheid activism. He told Reggie about an opportunity to fight apartheid by encouraging financial institutions to stop doing business in South Africa because of its discriminatory laws. As a member of the Cincinnati Council, Reggie had an influence. He got the City of Cincinnati’s pension board to divest financially from South Africa. This move was so influential that Desmond Tutu called him and asked to meet him. When he visited, he praised Reggie on how the divestment from the Cincinnati pension board was the last nail in the coffin, and that the move meant that apartheid could finally be buried in the past, as the divestment was one of the last financial relationships between South Africa and the US to turn sour. 

Reggie played a role in the anti-apartheid struggle. His role in convincing Cincinnati’s pension board to divest from South Africa had an immense effect on the freedom of this country and should not be forgotten.