In December 1968, the South African Students’ Organisation (Saso) was established by African and Indian students, heralding the start of the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) and providing an alternative to black membership of the non-racial Nusas.

Saso’s aim was ‘to liberate blacks from their own attitudes of inferiority and subservience before political rights could be achieved’.

In July 1972, the Black People’s Convention (BPC) was established to co-ordinate the various group which adhered to the Black Consciousness philosophy. In March 1973, Stephen Bantu Biko, President of Saso and other leaders of the BCM were banned in the wake of a series of unofficial strikes by black workers in Durban. Biko was prohibited from addressing public meetings and was restricted to King Williams Town in the Eastern Cape. In 1974, nine members of the Saso leadership were convicted on charges under the Terrorism Act for fomenting student disorder on black campuses and were imprisoned on Robben Island.

In September 1977, Biko died after twenty-six days in detention, in the course of which he was subjected to appallingly inhumane treatment.

The Soweto Uprising

Early in 1976, the Bantu Education Department under its Minister, M C Botha, and Deputy Minister, Andries Treurnicht, directed that Afrikaans would be used together with English as a medium of instruction in secondary schools under its jurisdiction. This ruling meant the imposition of third language instruction in a system already gravely handicapped by inadequate, run-down schools, over-crowded classrooms, insufficient books and no equipment. It was enough to push the pupils to the limit of their endurance. To the Bantu Education authorities this was just another departmental directive that they expected to be implemented without question. The views of opposition members of parliament, organisations such as the South African Institute of Race Relations or of the teachers and students who were affected by the ruling, were rejected or ignored as were the many warnings to the Minister and his deputy about the rising anger over the ruling.

On 16 June hundreds of Soweto pupils gathered early in the morning in numerous localities, many bearing posters decrying the use of the Afrikaans language.