Apartheid: the Law of Racial Segregation in South Africa

I have chosen this topic because I find apartheid really interesting and I want to dig deeper in what apartheid is and what it did for sports and the difference Nelson Mandela made. Apartheid was a system of racial segregation in South Africa founded in 1948 to 1994. Under apartheid people were divided into groups of your race the biggest was black, white, colored and Asian. The majority of the black people were sent to their “native country” but in reality they never have seen that area. The purpose with the law was that black people there where living in a white area had no rights to vote or influence on the area they were living in. the only place where they had something near rights was in their “native country”. Education, doctors and other public things were also divided and the ones there were available for the blacks were in general worse than the ones the white people got. The black people couldn’t be out after sunset and they should always have a passport on them. The passport law made it illegal for black people to go on the white people areas. The black and colored should have id on them all time. “Group areas act” in 1950 became the heart in the apartheid system there geographical displayed races “Separate Amenties Act” in 1950 the most racist division. Separate parks, beaches, busses hospitals, schools and university. Sports under apartheid.

The sport was also divided between black and white. Lack of funds to provide proper equipment would be noticeable in regards to black amateur football matches, this revealed the unequal lives Africans were subject to, in contrast to Whites who were obviously much better off financially. Apartheid’s social engineering made it more difficult to compete across racial lines, thus in an effort to centralise finances the federations merged in 1951, creating the South African Soccer Federation (SASF), which brought Black, Indian and Coloured national associations into one body that opposed apartheid. This was generally opposed more and more by the growing apartheid government and with urban segregation being reinforced with ongoing racist policies; it was harder to play football along these racial lines. While football was plagued by racism, it also played a role in protesting apartheid and its policies. With the international bans from FIFA and other major sporting events, South Africa would be in the spotlight internationally.

Black journalists on the Johannesburg Drum magazine were the first to give the issue public exposure, with an intrepid special issue in 1955 that asked, “Why shouldn’t our blacks be allowed in the SA team?” As time progressed, international standing with South Africa would continue to be strained. In the 80s, as the oppressive system was slowly collapsing the ANC and National Party started negotiations on the end of apartheid. Football associations also discussed the formation of a single, non-racial controlling body. This unity process accelerated in the late 1980s and led to the creation, in December 1991, of an incorporated South African Football Association. On 3 July 1992, FIFA finally welcomed South Africa back into international football.Sport has long been an important part of life in South Africa, and the boycotting of games by international teams had a profound effect on the white population, perhaps more so than the trade embargoes did. After the re-acceptance of South Africa’s sports teams by the international community, Sport played a major unifying role between the country’s races. Nelson Mandela’s open support of the previously white-dominated rugby fraternity when South Africa hosted and won the 1995 Rugby World Cup went a long way to repairing broken race relations. Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela was born 18 july 1918 is a South African politician who served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, the first ever to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Before being elected President, Mandela was a militant anti-apartheid activist, and the leader and co-founder of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC). In 1962 he was arrested and convicted of sabotage and other charges, and sentenced to life imprisonment. Mandela went on to serve 27 years in prison, spending many of these years on Robben Island. Following his release from prison on 11 February 1990, Mandela led his party in the negotiations that led to the establishment of democracy in 1994. As President, he frequently gave priority to reconciliation, while introducing policies aimed at combating poverty and inequality in South Africa.

Mandela was in prison on Robben Island where he remained for the next eighteen of his twenty-seven years in prison. While in jail, his reputation grew and he became widely known as the most significant black leader in South Africa. On the island, he and others performed hard labour in a lime quarry. Prison conditions were very basic. Prisoners were segregated by race, with black prisoners receiving the fewest rations. Political prisoners were kept separate from ordinary criminals and received fewer privileges. Mandela describes how, as a D-group prisoner (the lowest classification) he was allowed one visitor and one letter every six months. Letters, when they came, were often delayed for long periods and made unreadable by the prison censors.