Photos

Leeds City Council formally welcomed ANC representative Ruth Mompati to Leeds in the winter of 1982. In the picture with Ruth Mompati is the Deputy Lord Mayor Rose Lund. The Council named the gardens in front of the Civic Hall the Nelson Mandela Gardens. Leeds was one of many local authorities to show its opposition to apartheid in the 1980s.

In 1982 Leeds City Council renamed the gardens in front of Leeds City Hall Nelson Mandela Gardens.

Students at Newcastle University protested against a visit by representatives of South African mining companies Gencor and Rand Mines in April 1983. The companies were recruiting mining and metallurgy graduates to work in South Africa. Newcastle students also banned the sale of South African Airways tickets through the Student Union and named part of their union building after Nelson Mandela.

Tyneside AA Group picketed a concert by singer-songwriter Leo Sayer in Newcastle City Hall in May 1983. Sayer had played in Sun City, South Africa, in contravention of the cultural boycott. In 1983 the UN Special Committee against Apartheid set up a register of performers who had played in South Africa. Newcastle City Council tried to cancel the concert, but was forced to let it go ahead after consulting legal opinion. In the picture is Namibian student Gotthard Garoeb.

The Moroka Three, Jerry Mosololi, Marcus Motaung and Simon Mogoerane,  were young ANC members convicted of belonging to the ANC’s armed wing Umkhonto we Sizwe. They were sentenced to death and hanged on 9 June 1983 in spite of a huge international campaign for clemency. Supporters of SATIS (Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society) held an all night vigil outside the South African embassy on the night before their execution. The picture shows a South African Embassy official removing wreaths attached to the embassy gate in memory of the three young men.

The Festival of African Sounds at Alexandra Palace, north London, celebrated Nelson Mandela’s 65th birthday in July 1983. Zenani Mandela was a special guest. The bust of Mandela in the photograph was created by sculptor Ian Walters. Mandela’s birthday was marked by events all over Britain. The London Borough of Greenwich awarded him the freedom of the borough and public gardens were named after him in Leeds and Hull.

Mike Terry, Bob Hughes MP and Abdul Minty at the Festival of African Sounds held to celebrate Nelson Mandela’s 65th birthday in 1983. Zenani Mandela was a special guest. The bust of Mandela in the photograph was created by sculptor Ian Walters. Mandela’s birthday was marked by events all over Britain. The London Borough of Greenwich awarded him the freedom of the borough and public gardens were named after him in Leeds and Hull.

Students from University College London built a hut from scrap materials on the steps of St Martin’s in the Fields to show passers-by how black South Africans lived in shanty towns like Crossroads, October 1983.