Hip hop identity in a township reality. - Poppunt

percent was reserved for whites, with only about thirteen percent divided into ten
homelands for blacks although they counted for sixty percent of the population
(Wikipedia). Four of them were given independence (see the Tomlinson proposition)
but this was never recognised by the international community. The six other
homelands received regional self-rule (Vervliet: 12). The ultimate goal would be that
all black South Africans would loose their status of South African citizens and
acquire the nationality of their homeland. In reality, the homeland policy was not
strictly taken. Many blacks lived outside their ascribed homelands because of the
lack of an economical basis there (Vervliet: 18). If they wanted to earn money, they
had no choice but to go to the white cities.
Several (political) parties began to oppose against the established apartheid regime
in the form of strikes and protest marches. The African National Congress (hereafter
ANC; established in 1912 to defend the black people’s rights) (Vervliet: 21) was one
of them. In 1959 some former ANC members set up the more militant Pan African
Congress (PAC). They held several demonstrations against the pass laws among
others. Marches were organised to police stations where people burned their passes
as a way of protest against the system (Ross: 158). On the 21 st of March 1960, a
crowd of black people assembled in a township called Sharpeville to demonstrate
against the identity cards that they had to carry according to the pass law. The
crowd (estimates about the number of people vary tremendously from 300 to
20.000) proceeded to the local police station and gave themselves up for arrest for
not carrying their passbooks. About 300 policemen opened fire on the unarmed and
non-violent demonstrators from which 69 were killed (according to Walraet 72
people were killed) and 186 injured (Ross: 158). Most of them had been shot in the
back. This event is recorded in history as the ‘Sharpeville Massacre’. After this, the
government banned the ANC and the PAC and several members were arrested. Even
so, nation-wide demonstrations continued, along with a massive stay-away from
work was organised.
After the Rivonia trial (which was condemned by the UN Security Council), Nelson
Mandela (the ANC leader) and seven other fellow leaders were sentenced to life
imprisonment at Robben Island for terrorism in June 1964 (Wikipedia). Oliver
Thambo, also a leader of the ANC escaped the country and lead the ANC in exile for
the next thirty years (Wikipedia).
Between the 1960s and the early 1980s the government implemented a policy of
resettlement (Wikipedia). People were forced to move to the homelands they were
assigned (Wikipedia). Estimates claim that about three and a half million people