6 Apartheid Long walk to freedom Read the following extract from Nelson Mandela’s autobiography. Nelson Mandela became a member of the African National Congress (ANC) in 1944 and supported peaceful resistance. After the ANC was banned, Mandela had to go underground and was forced to use more violent tactics. While he was in prison, Nelson Mandela became the symbol of the anti-Apartheid movement. The following paragraphs from Mandela’s autobiography Long walk to freedom show what Apartheid meant for Black South Africans. In the 1940s, travelling for an African was a complicated process. All Africans over the age of sixteen were compelled to carry “Native passes” issued by the Native Affairs Department, and were required to show that pass to any white policeman, civil servant or employer. Failure to do so could mean arrest, trial, a jail sentence or fine. The pass stated where the bearer lived, who his chief was, and whether he had paid the annual poll tax, which was a tax levied only on Africans. Later, the pass took the form of a booklet or “Reference Book”, as it was known, containing detailed information that had to be signed by one’s employer every month. […] It was a crime to walk through a Whites Only door, a crime to ride a Whites Only bus, a crime to use a Whites Only drinking fountain, a crime to walk on a Whites Only beach, a crime to be on the streets after 11 p.m., a crime not to have a pass book and a crime to have the wrong signature in that book, a crime to be unemployed and a crime to be employed in the wrong place, a crime to live in certain places and a crime to have no place to live. […] My bans extended to meetings of all kinds, not only political ones. I could not, for example, attend my son’s birthday party. I was prohibited from talking to more than one person at a time. This was part of a systematic effort by the government to silence, persecute and immobilise the leaders of those fighting Apartheid and was the first of a series of bans on me that continued with brief intervals of freedom until the time I was deprived of all freedom some years later. Questions a) What effects do you think Apartheid had on Black and white South Africans? Make two lists. b) Which reasons were there for the Apartheid laws? Language and style a) Write down the different words and phrases that Mandela uses to describe what Blacks were allowed or not allowed to do in your learning journal, e.g.: They were compelled to carry “Native passes”. b) What effect is created by the use of repetition in the second paragraph? 1 VIP file Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela • 1918: born in Qunu, Eastern Cape • 1944: joins the ANC (African National Congress), which fights for the rights of Blacks • 1964–1990: in prison for anti-Apartheid activism • 1993: Nobel Peace Prize • 1994: elected as first Black president of South Africa (until 1999) • 2013: dies aged 95 V 2 Fact file ANC • 1912: formed to bring all Africans together as one people. • 1950s: Defiance Campaign begins mass resistance to Apartheid • 1960: banned • 1961: beginning of armed struggle against the government • 1990: unbanned • 1994: wins first free South African elections as social democratic party with 62.6% of the votes, Mandela becomes president • Since 1994: ANC wins every election but continuing dissatisfaction with ANC-led government F 3 j 5 10 15 20 80 South Africa Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv
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