22/01/2019
We all hear of Mandela, but how many of us have actually heard of Robert Sobukwe (1924-1978) A scholar, lawyer, founder and leader of the Pan-Africanist Congress of Azania and one of the first to propose a “nonracial” rather than “multiracial” society in Apartheid South Africa, Sobukwe and the Pan-Africanist congress were regarded as the greatest threat to the continued rule of the apartheid state in Southern Africa, more so than the African National Congress and its leaders as that of Mandela and Oliver Tambo. It was the Pan-Africanist Congress that lead the struggle against Apartheid and colonialism in South Africa before the African National Congress secured the support of great revolutionary African leaders as that of Julius Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda, and Samora Machel.
In 1960, Sobukwe organized several mass protests against the Apartheid Government. On the morning of March 21 1960, Sobukwe left his home in Mofolo, Soweto, to lead a small crowd on an eight-kilometer march to Orlando police station. At the same time he ordered several thousand others to march against another police station in the town of Sharpeville.
What few expected was that this day would be Sobukwe’s last taste of freedom. Sobukwe was so feared by the apartheid government he would spend the rest of his life in either solitary confinement or internal exile, remaining under house arrest for 18 years until his death. It was also the day in which members of the Pan-Africanist Congress would be massacred in Sharpeville. It was in response to this mass slaughter that prompted Nelson Mandela, in the iconic photo, to burn the ‘passbook’ all blacks were forced to carry for identification under apartheid law.
Sobukwe was an unwavering Pan-Africanist, and stressed the value of African Unity, declaring that “We regard it as the sacred duty of every African state, to strive ceaselessly and energetically for the creation of a United States of Africa, stretching from Cape to Cairo, Morocco to Madagascar”.
