Browse the AAM Archive

Oil was the one major commodity that South Africa did not possess. In the 1970s the chief oil exporting countries imposed an oil embargo on South Africa. This was circumvented by the major Western oil companies, including Shell and BP. The two companies were joint owners of South Africa’s largest oil refinery. This leaflet was produced for a special month of boycott of Shell and BP in June 1981. 

ANC President Oliver Tambo was the main speaker at a rally held in London to mark South Africa Freedom Day on 26 June 1981. He told AAM supporters ‘It is your struggle as it is ours’. Also on the platform were ANC representative Ruth Mompati, FRELIMO leader and future Mozambique President Armando Guebuza, SACTU General Secretary John Gaetsewe and SWAPO Deputy Secretary for Labour P Munyaro.

This banner saying ‘No Shell-BP Oil for Apartheid’ was suspended from a footbridge in Southampton in June 1981. The action was part of a national Month of Boycott of Shell and BP organised by the AAM. Southampton AA Group members picketed local Shell and BP garages throughout the month. 

Disabled AAM supporters picketed the opening day of the International Stoke Mandeville Games, forerunner of the Paralympics, in July 1981. They were calling for South Africa to be barred from the Games. The following year a new group, Disabled People Against Apartheid was formed with support from all the main organisations representing disabled people in Britain. South Africa was expelled from the Games in 1985.

In 1981 the South African Springbok rugby tour of New Zealand provoked mass opposition and the biggest demonstrations in New Zealand’s history. New Zealanders in London picketed the New Zealand High Commission to show their support for the protests back home. 

In April 1981 the South African’s Energy Minister F W de Klerk announced that the country could manufacture uranium fuel elements. A UN report concluded that South Africa was now a nuclear power. This meeting, organised by Hackney AA Group and Hackney Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, featured the 1980 World in Action film ‘Follow the Yellow Brick Road’, which exposed Britain’s illegal imports of uranium from Namibia.

The tenth NUS/AAM annual student conference, held at Queen Mary College, London in July 1981, focused on campaigning for the isolation of South Africa and placed renewed emphasis on the consumer boycott. This paper highlighted campaigns for an oil embargo, against South Africa’s nuclear bomb, against Barclays Bank’s involvement in South Africa, for disinvestment and an academic and recruitment boycott. The conference was attended by around 100 students from 50 colleges.

Nelson Mandela was given the Freedom of the City of Glasgow on 4 August 1981. Glasgow was the first of many British cities to honour Mandela in this way. The photograph shows ANC representative Ruth Mompati at a meeting in Glasgow City Chambers held after the award ceremony. Also in the photo are Nigerian Vice-President Alex Ekwueme,  the Lord Provost of Glasgow Michael Kelly and Scottish AA Committee Chair, Brian Filling.