Our latest Document of the Week, chosen by our Senior Curator, Dr Mary Wills, gives insight into a series of bus boycotts in Johannesburg and Pretoria townships in South Africa in 1957. Newspapers excerpts report on protests against increasing public transport fees and other segregating practices. The bus boycotts are generally recognised as being one of the few successful single-issue political campaigns of the apartheid era in South Africa.
These typed press digests are from the papers of Colin Legum (1919–2003), a South African journalist and writer on African politics. His weekly digests detail a range of issues regarding the experience of living under apartheid, including reports of civil disobedience.
Bus boycotts had taken place in Alexandra (on the outskirts on Johannesburg) before, in the 1940s, after bus fare increases. The 1957 bus boycott in Alexandra, which later spread to other districts of Johannesburg and Pretoria, was a protest undertaken against the Public Utility Transport Corporation after another rise in fares.
At its height, 70,000 township residents refused to ride the local buses to and from work. For most, this meant walking twenty miles a day to and from Johannesburg. Some received lifts from supporters, or “misguided members of the public”, in the words of the Minister of Transport, Mr Ben Schoeman.
The boycott was named “Azikwelwa” (We Will Not Ride). The Alexandra People’s Transport Action Committee (APTAC) was formed, consisting of several local groups including the Standholders and Tenants Association. The “determined organisation” and “organised black front”, as reported in Volksblad newspaper, also involved more radical groups, including those led by the political revolutionary, Daniel Mokonyane.
Despite racist criticism, as seen here, by some in the press, the boycotters stood firm, with the Chamber of Commerce finally agreeing to a public subsidy that would restore the old price. The bus company agreed to rescind the increase in bus fare.
Where to find this document
These press excerpts feature in our collection, Reporting on Africa: From Apartheid to Pan-Africanism, 1949–1995. This includes a range of Colin Legum’s writings and reports on twentieth century African politics.