But in the aftermath of the Sharpeville massacre, the UN adopted a more interventionist stance to the apartheid state. The Department of Home Affairs (a government bureau) was responsible for the classification of the citizenry. In response, a police officer shouted in Afrikaans skiet or nskiet (exactly which is not clear). Ingrid de Kok was a child living on a mining compound near Johannesburg where her father worked at the time of the Sharpeville massacre. The impact of the events in Cape Town were felt in other neighbouring towns such as Paarl, Stellenbosch, Somerset West and Hermanus as anti-pass demonstrations spread. Many of the contemporary issues in South Africa can easily be associated with the apartheid laws which devastated the country. During the Eisenhower administration, Congress passed two measures that proved to be ineffective: the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and the Civil Rights Act of 1960. These resolutions established two important principles: that the human rights provisions in the UN Charter created binding obligations for member states, and that the UN could intervene directly in situations involving serious violations of human rights. All Rights Reserved. It was adopted on 21 December 1965. Pheko, M. (2000) Focus: 'Lest We Forget Sharpeville', The Sowetan, 20 March. [6]:pp.14,528 From the 1960s, the pass laws were the primary instrument used by the state to detain and harass its political opponents. The police were armed with firearms, including Sten submachine guns and LeeEnfield rifles. The PAC called on its supporters to leave their passes at home on the appointed date and gather at police stations around the country, making themselves available for arrest. Youth standing up against racism was the 2021 theme, aimed at fostering a global culture of tolerance, equality and non-discrimination that calls on each one of us to stand up against racial prejudice and intolerant attitudes. Sunday marks the 50th anniversary of the day that changed the course of South African history. All the evidence points to the gathering being peaceful and good-humoured. The massacre was one of the catalysts for a shift from passive resistance to armed resistance by these organisations. But it was not until after Sharpeville that the UN made clear that the countrys system of racial segregation would no longer be tolerated. The Sharpeville Massacre took place in a south african police station of Sharpeville. Initially the police commander refused but much later, approximately 11h00, they were let through; the chanting of freedom songs continued and the slogans were repeated with even greater volume. On March 21st, 1960, the Pan Africanists Congress, an anti-Apartheid splinter organization formed in 1959, organized a protest to the National Partys pass laws which required all citizens, as well as native Africans, to carry identification papers on them at all times. The incident resulted in the largest number of South African deaths (up to that point) in a protest against apartheid . BlackPast.org is a 501(c)(3) non-profit and our EIN is 26-1625373. At least 180 were wounded. The movement in this period that revived the political opposition against the apartheid was the Black Consciousness Movement. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Sobukwe was only released in 1969. Approximately 10,000 Africans were forcibly removed to Sharpeville. (2000) Focus: 'Lest We Forget', Sunday World, 19 March. Many thousands of individuals applied for the amnesty program and a couple thousand testified through the course of 2 years. The Sharpsville Massacre was a seminal moment in the history of South Africa. In addition other small groups of PAC activists presented themselves at police stations in Durban and East London. As well as the introduction of the race convention, Sharpeville also spurred other moves at the UN that changed the way it could act against countries that breached an individuals human rights. The poet Duncan Livingstone, a Scottish immigrant from the Isle of Mull who lived in Pretoria, wrote in response to the Massacre the Scottish Gaelic poem Bean Dubh a' Caoidh a Fir a Chaidh a Marbhadh leis a' Phoileas ("A Black Woman Mourns her Husband Killed by the Police"). In the late 1980s, one of the most popular anti-apartheid movements that contributed to the end of the apartheid was the Free Mandela campaign. This, said Mr Subukwe, would cause prisons to become overcrowded, labour to dry up and the economy to grind to a halt. OHCHRs regional representative Abigail Noko used the opportunity to call on all decision-makers to give youth a seat at the decision-making table. Yet only three policemen were reported to have been hit by stones - and more than 200 Africans were shot down. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. When the marchers reached Sharpeville's police station a heavy contingent of policemen were lined up outside, many on top of British-made Saracen armored cars. In March 1960, South African police shot dead 69 black protestors, sparking worldwide outrage . The protesters responded by hurling stones (striking three policemen) and rushing the police barricades. [6]:p.534, By 10:00, a large crowd had gathered, and the atmosphere was initially peaceful and festive. A new, third level of content, designed specially to meet the advanced needs of the sophisticated scholar. Lancaster University provides funding as a founding partner of The Conversation UK. The campaign slogan was "NO BAIL! The call for a stay away on 28 March was highly successful and was the first ever national strike in the countrys history. The OHCHR Regional Office for Southern Africa also produced a series of digital stories on the Sharpeville massacre and young peoples concerns about their human rights. Britannica does not review the converted text. This day is now commemorated annually in South Africa as a public . As the small crowd approached the station, most of the marchers, including Sobukwe, were arrested and charged with sedition. On the 60th anniversary of the Sharpeville massacre, the world should remember the contingency and fragility of the international human rights law system that we so easily take for granted today. During the shooting about 69 black people were killed. Coordinates: .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}264118S 275219E / 26.68833S 27.87194E / -26.68833; 27.87194. It authorized the limited use of arms and sabotage against the government, which got the governments attentionand its anger! [9] The Sharpeville police were not completely unprepared for the demonstration, as they had already driven smaller groups of more militant activists away the previous night. [10] Few of the policemen present had received public order training. His colleagues followed suit and opened fire. An article entitled "PAC Campaign will be test," published in the 19 March 1960 issue of Contact,the Liberal Party newspaper, described the build up to the campaign: At a press conference held on Saturday 19th March 1960, PAC President Robert Sobukwe announced that the PAC was going to embark on an anti-pass campaign on Monday the 21st. The Sharpeville Massacre On the morning of March 21, 1960, several thousand residents of Sharpeville marched to the township's police station. Forego a bottle of soda and donate its cost to us for the information you just learned, and feel good about helping to make it available to everyone. The significance of the date is reflected in the fact that it now marks the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Throughout the 1950s, South African blacks intensified their resistance against the oppressive apartheid system. The commission completed this task, under the chairmanship of Eleanor Roosevelt, when it finalised the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. However, many people joined the procession quite willingly. Police were temporarily paralyzed with indecision. It also contributed the headline story at the Anti-Racism Live Global Digital Experience that marked March 21 internationally with acclaimed artists, actors and prominent speakers from South Africa including Thuli Madonsela, Zulaikha Patel and Zwai Bala. Other PAC members tried to stop bus drivers from going on duty and this resulted in a lack transport for Sharpeville residents who worked in Vereeniging. A week later, a breakaway group from the ANC, the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) held its first conference in Johannesburg. That day about 20,000 people gathered near the Sharpeville police station. Following the Sharpeville massacre, as it came to be known, the death toll rose to 69 and the number of injuries to 180. The rally began peacefully, the iron bell was rung (usually it was rung to signal victories in football games) and one speaker started to speak. The story of March 21 1960 is told by Tom Lodge, a scholar of South African politics, in his book Sharpeville. Police arrested more than 11,000 people and kept them in jail. As an act of rebellion the passes were set alight, as seen in a picture by Ranjith Kally. When the news of the Sharpeville Massacre reached Cape Town a group of between 1000 to 5000 protestors gathered at the Langa Flats bus terminus around 17h00 on 21 March 1960. Reports of the incident helped focus international criticism on South Africas apartheid policy. . The Sharpeville Massacre awakened the international community to the horrors of apartheid. I hated what it did to people, As Israelis dedicated to peace, we oppose Trump's apartheid plan, UN human rights head in unprecedented action against Indian government, Anyone can become a climate refugee. The South African governments repressive measures in response to the Sharpeville Massacre, however, intensified and expended the opposition to apartheid, ushering in three decades of resistance and protest in the country and increasing condemnation by world leaders. This caused many other countries to criticize South Africas apartheid policy. When the demonstrators began to throw stones at the police, the police started shooting into the crowd. Fewer than 20 police officers were present in the station at the start of the protest. The Sharpeville massacre, the name given to the murder of 69 unarmed civilians by armed South African police, took place on 21 March 1960. Learn about employment opportunities across the UN in South Africa. According to his "Testimony about the Launch of the Campaign," Sobukwe declared: To read more witness accounts of the Sharpeville Massacre, click on the, According to an account from Humphrey Tyler, the assistant editor at, Afrikaner Nationalism, Anglo American and Iscor: formation of Highveld Steel and Vanadium Corporation, 1960-70 in Business History", The Sharpeville Massacre: Its historic significance in the struggle against apartheid, The PAC's War against the State 1960-1963, in The Road to Democracy in South Africa: 1960-1970, The Sharpeville Massacre - A watershed in SouthAfrica, Saluting Sharpevilles heroes, and South Africa's human rights, New Books | Robert Sobukwes letters from prison, South African major mass killings timeline 1900-2012, Origins: Formation, Sharpeville and banning, 1959-1960, 1960-1966: The genesis of the armed struggle, Womens resistance in the 1960s - Sharpeville and its aftermath, Eyewitness accounts of the Sharpeville massacre 1960, List of victims of police action, 21 March, 1960 (Sharpeville and Langa), A tragic turning-point: remembering Sharpeville fifty years on by Paul Maylam, Apartheid: Sharpeville Massacre, 21 March 1960, Commission of Enquiry into the Occurrences at Sharpeville (and other places) on the 21st March, 1960, Volume 1, Johannesburg, 15 June 1960, Commission of Enquiry into the Occurrences at Sharpeville (and other places) on the 21st March, 1960, Volume 2, Johannesburg, 15 June 1960, Documents, and articles relating to the Sharpeville Massacre 1960, Editorial comment: The legacy of Sharpeville, From Our Vault: Sharpeville, A Crime That Still Echoes by J Brooks Spector, 21 March 2013, South Africa, Message to the PAC on Sharpeville Day by Livingstone Mqotsi, Notes on the origins of the movement for Sanctions against South Africa by E.S. [10] At about 13:00 the police tried to arrest a protester, and the crowd surged forward. The PAC and the African National Congress, another antiapartheid party, were banned. Amid confusion, two shots were fired into the air by somebody in the crowd. The police response to the protest became the primary cause of the massacre. Even so and estimated 2000 to 3000 people gathered on the Commons. A policeman was accidently pushed over and the crowd began to move forward to see what was happening. Eyewitness accounts attest to the fact that the people were given no warning to disperse. The only Minister who showed any misgivings regarding government policy was Paul Sauer. Sharpeville is a township near Vereeniging, in the Gauteng province of South Africa . At this point the National Guard chose to disperse the crowd, fearing that the situation might get out of hand and grow into another violent protest. Professor of International Law, Lancaster University. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. NO DEFENCE! Just after 1pm, there was an altercation between the police officer in charge and the leaders of the demonstration. In the 1960s, many of the colonial nations of Africa were gaining independence. On March 21, an estimated 7,000 South Africans gathered in front of the Sharpeville police station to protest against the restrictive pass laws. Early on the 21st the local PAC leaders first gathered in a field not far from the Sharpeville police station, when a sizable crowd of people had joined them they proceeded to the police station - chanting freedom songs and calling out the campaign slogans "Izwe lethu" (Our land); "Awaphele amapasti" (Down with passes); "Sobukwe Sikhokhele" (Lead us Sobukwe); "Forward to Independence,Tomorrow the United States of Africa.". Some of them remain in prison", "Sharpeville Memorial, Theunis Kruger Street, Dicksonville, Sharpville ABLEWiki", Calls for inquiry into Israels Gaza killings, Storming of the Kempton Park World Trade Centre, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sharpeville_massacre&oldid=1140778365, Killings by law enforcement officers in South Africa, Short description is different from Wikidata, Use South African English from April 2016, All Wikipedia articles written in South African English, Articles with unsourced statements from January 2023, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 21 February 2023, at 19:08. When protesters reconvened in defiance, the police charged at them with batons, tear gas and guns. All that changed following the worlds moral outrage at the killings. A state of emergency was announced in South Africa. Riding into the small group of protestors, they forced most to withdraw, but a few stood fast around a utility pole where horsemen began to beat them. It was one of the first and most violent demonstrations against apartheid in South Africa. Your donation is fully tax-deductible. We hope you and your family enjoy the NEW Britannica Kids. The massacre also sparked hundreds of mass protests by black South Africans, many of which were ruthlessly and violently crushed by the South African police and military. And then there are those who feel deeply involved and moved, but also powerless to deal with the enormity of the situation (Krog 221). Despite the Sharpeville massacre feeling seismic in its brutality, "we all thought at that moment that it would cause a change in the political situation in South Africa," said Berry - "it was really ten years before anything changed." . [21], In 1998, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) found that the police actions constituted "gross human rights violations in that excessive force was unnecessarily used to stop a gathering of unarmed people. Later, in the fifties and the sixties, these same goals, enlign poll taxes and literacy tests, were once again fought for by African American leaders, through advocacy and agitation. Another officer interpreted this as an order and opened fire, triggering a lethal fusillade as 168 police constables followed his example. After apartheid ended, President Nelson Mandela chose Sharpeville as the place to sign South Africas new constitution on December 10, 1996. To share with more than one person, separate addresses with a comma. In 1946, the UN established the Commission on Human Rights, whose first job was to draft a declaration on human rights. However, the nations mentality needed work - though the popularity of Civil Rights was rising, many riots and racial hate crimes continued to occur throughout the country, with many casualties resulting from them (infoplease.com). On the 21st of March 1960, black residents of Sharpeville took to the police station to protest against the use of the dompas in South Africa. As a result of racial segregation, resistance from coloured people in both the United States and South Africa escalated. Accessible across all of today's devices: phones, tablets, and desktops. Sharpeville Massacre Newzroom Afrika 229K subscribers Subscribe 178 Share 19K views 2 years ago As South Africa commemorates Human Rights Day, victims and families of those who died at the. Mandela went into hiding in 1964, he was captured, tried, and sentenced to life imprisonment. His protest was ignored, and the government turned a blind eye to the increasing protests from industrialists and leaders of commerce. News reports about the massacre spread across the world. That date now marks the International Day for the. [12], Many White South Africans were also horrified by the massacre. Nelson Mandela was a member of the banned African National Congress and led an underground armed movement that opposed the apartheid by attacking government buildings in South Africa during the early 1960s. African American History: Research Guides & Websites, Global African History: Research Guides & Websites, African American Scientists and Technicians of the Manhattan Project, Envoys, Diplomatic Ministers, & Ambassadors, Foundation, Organization, and Corporate Supporters. At its inaugural session in 1947, the UN Commission on Human Rights had decided that it had no power to take any action in regard to any complaints concerning human rights. As part of its response, the General Assembly tasked the UN Commission on Human Rights to prepare the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the first global human rights treaty. Robert Sobukwe and other leaders were arrested and detained after the Sharpeville massacre, some for nearly three years after the incident. The term human rights was first used in the UN Charter in 1945. The march was also led by Clarence Makwetu, the Secretary of the PACs New Flats branch. The commission completed this task, under the chairmanship of Eleanor Roosevelt, when it finalised the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. On 20 March Nana Mahomo and Peter Molotsi has crossed the border into Bechuanaland to mobilize support for the PAC. Following shortly, the Group Areas Act of 1950 was enacted as a new form of legislation alongside the Population Registration Act. . By 1960, however, anti-apartheid activism reached the town. For them to gather means violence. The Minister of Justice called for calm and the Minister of Finance encouraged immigration. This angered the officers causing them to brutally attack and tear gas the demonstrators. The Sharpeville massacre. March 21, is celebrated as a public holiday in honor of human rights and to commemorate the . As the campaign went on, the apartheid government started imposing strict punishments on people who violated the segregationist laws. Under this system there was an extended period of gruesome violence against individuals of colored skin in South Africa. The people of South Africa struggle day by day to reverse the most cruel, yet well-crafted, horrific tactic of social engineering. The concept behind apartheid emerged in 1948 when the nationalist party took over government, and the all-white government enforced racial segregation under a system of legislation . Sixty-nine Africans were killed and 186 were wounded, with most shot in the back. At the annual conference of the African National Congress (ANC) held in Durban on 16 December 1959, the President General of the ANC, Chief Albert Luthuli, announced that 1960 was going to be the "Year of the Pass." The protesters offered themselves up for arrest for not carrying their passes. Find out what the UN in South Africa is doing towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. By 9 April the death toll had risen to 83 non-White civilians and three non-White police officers. [7][8], On 21 March, 1960, a group of between 5,000 and 10,000 people converged on the local police station, offering themselves up for arrest for not carrying their passbooks. The logjam was only broken after the Sharpeville massacre, as the UN decided to deal with the problem of apartheid South Africa. Take a minute to check out all the enhancements! Start your Independent Premium subscription today. According to his "Testimony about the Launch of the Campaign," Sobukwe declared: At the press conference Sobukwe emphasized that the campaign should be conducted in a spirit of absolute non-violence and that the PAC saw it as the first step in Black people's bid for total independence and freedom by 1963 (Cape Times, 1960). With the election of Nelson Mandela as president of South Africa in 1994, the apartheid system ended. The adoption of the convention was quickly followed by two international covenants on economic, social and cultural rights and on civil and political rights in 1966, introduced to give effect to the rights in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These two industries experienced rapid growth in the immediate aftermath of World War II and continued growing into the 1950s and 1960s. A dompass in those days was an Identification Document that determined who you were, your birth date, what race you are and permission from your employers to be in a specific place at a specific time. These resolutions established two important principles: that the human rights provisions in the UN Charter created binding obligations for member states, and the UN could intervene directly in situations involving serious violations of human rights. March 16 saw a demonstration in Montgomery, Alabama in which 580 demonstrators planned to march from the Jackson Street Baptist Church to the Montgomery County Courthouse (Reed 26). Dr. Verwoerd praised the police for their actions. . In Pretoria a small group of six people presented themselves at the Hercules police station. What event happened on March 21 1960? Just after 1pm, there was an altercation between the police officer in charge and the leaders of the demonstration. In her moving poem Our Sharpeville she reflects on the atrocity through the eyes of a child. [17], Not all reactions were negative: embroiled in its opposition to the Civil Rights Movement, the Mississippi House of Representatives voted a resolution supporting the South African government "for its steadfast policy of segregation and the [staunch] adherence to their traditions in the face of overwhelming external agitation. In November 1961, a military branch of the party was organized with Mandela as its head. Furthermore, the history of the African civil rights movement validated: Nationalism has been tested in the peoples struggles .