1980s

A delegation delivered a letter to 10 Downing Street, calling on Prime Minister Thatcher to drop her opposition to sanctions against South Africa, as demonstrators marched up Whitehall on 16 June 1985. In the photograph are Zerbanoo Gifford from the Liberal Party, AAM Executive Secretary, Mike Terry, AAM President, Trevor Huddleston and Chair, Bob Hughes MP, Hidipo Hamutenya and Shapua Kaukungua from SWAPO, Denis Goldberg and Clarence Thompson from the West Indian Standing Conference.

Clarence Thompson, General Secretary of the West Indian Standing Conference, speaking at the AAM rally in Trafalgar Square on 16 June 1985. 25,000 people marched up Whitehall to Trafalgar Square on 16 June 1985 to demand sanctions against South Africa. Left to right: Jerry Herman from the US Disinvestment Campaign, Trevor Huddleston, Denis Goldberg of the ANC, Clarence Thompson, Zerbanoo Gifford of the Liberal Party and SWAPO leader Hidipo Hamutenya.

A supporter of End Loans to Southern Africa (ELTSA) at a Barclays cashpoint on Victoria Street, central London, 16 June 1985. His P W Botha mask symbolised Barclays Bank’s support for the apartheid regime.

Activists in the multi-racial area of St Paul’s, Bristol declared it an anti-apartheid free zone in the mid-1980s. Opposition to apartheid was so strong that the local Tesco’s stopped stocking South African goods.

The AAM followed up its 1985 March month of boycott with a day of action focusing on Tesco on 6 July. Anti-apartheid campaigners distributed this leaflet outside Tesco stores all over Britain. The Tesco branch in the multi-racial area of St Paul’s, Bristol, was the first to announce that it would stop selling South African products.

An arson attack was made on the AAM office at 13 Mandela Street, central London, in July 1985. In the photograph AAM Executive Secretary Mike Terry examines the extensive damage done to the building.

On 20 July 1985 the apartheid government imposed a draconian State of Emergency in key areas of South Africa. As well as protesting outside the South African Embassy, the AAM met Conservative Foreign Office Minister Malcolm Rifkind to press for sanctions against South Africa.

President P W Botha imposed a state of emergency over large parts of South Africa on 20 July 1985. The army and police were ordered to ‘shoot to kill’ protesters and many African townships were sealed off from the outside world. This AAM leaflet accused the British government of being the ‘Number One Protector’ of apartheid by blocking sanctions within the Commonwealth and at the UN.