DnA 9-16: Passion Justified...
brought to ya from deep in tha third woild
by pHaze
Tomorrow is 'Sharpeville Day' and the University of Cape Town is closed - so I get the day off and have the time to write this.
Well, that's from my point of view anyway - a practical one. Of course the reason the University is closed is an emotional one - because there are going to be allot of emotions flowing tomorrow, and the 'crowd animal' will cause damage as usual.
My first introduction to this animal was at the release of Nelson Mandela. Shops were looted and rubber bullets were flying. I used to think the same way as most other white South Africans; "Well the shit will blow over soon and hopefully 'they' wont cause too much damage" - and it always did....
But then I looked behind at what was causing all the fuss and the story behind Sharpeville is one of the things I found.......
Sharpeville
In 1959 Robert Sobukwe led a breakaway from the ANC into a new organization named the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC), of which he was elected president. He called blacks to galvanize themselves in resistance against pass laws, the symbol of white domination.
The PAC planned its first protest to take place on Monday 21 March 1960. Early on the Monday PAC activists ran through township streets, knocking on doors and telling the occupants to join processions outside. Launching the campaign, Sobukwe walked solemnly in front of a team of PAC colleagues to Soweto's police headquarters in Orlando, where they handed in their passes, announced themselves as the leaders of the work stayaway, and were promptly arrested for incitement.
What happened afterwards in a township called Sharpeville, thirty miles south of Johannesburg, was to prove a tragic endorsement of Sobukwe's prophecy a few days earlier, when he said: 'The tree of freedom is watered with blood.'
Answering the PAC's call to assemble in the streets, Sharpeville residents milled around during the morning, most not knowing exactly what was expected of them. They drifted to the township superintendent's office and to the school square, finally converging on the police station. Word began to spread that a statement was to be made about pass laws by an important government official from Pretoria. Circulating for hours, the rumor became embellished to the point where some standing outside the police station expected an announcement scrapping passes forever.
By midday the crowd had swelled to 20,000 according to police estimates, though blacks denied their number ever exceeded 5,000. Reports reaching Johannesburg newspapers claimed the demonstrators were in a hostile mood, and two cars carrying journalists were stoned as they approached the police station. In Evatin, a nearby township, thousands of demonstrators were readily dispersed by jets swooping overhead, but similar tactics failed to shift the Sharpeville crowd. A squadron of planes repeatedly diving towards them brought cheers from children and had the opposite of its intended effect, bringing more people to the area to see what was happening.
As the crowd swelled, local police discovered their telephone was out of order. Calling the town of Vereeniging - three miles away - by radio, they waited for reinforcements. Five Saracen armored cars arrived, inching their way through the demonstrators and bringing the total number of police from twelve in the early morning to 200 by lunchtime.
The head of the Special Branch , Colonel Spengler arrived at 1.00 P.M., followed soon afterwards by Lieutenant-Colonel Pienaar, a senior officer from Witwatersrand police headquarters. Spengler tried to address the demonstrators but his voice was drowned. The crowd jostled and the fence around the police station began to sway. Pienaar ordered his armed men to line up facing the demonstrators. Then Spengler became entangled in a brief scuffle at the station gates. Seeing his colleague stumbling back from the crowd, Pienaar told the police to load five rounds, not realizing that some had already loaded their weapons fully.
Deciding to arrest the ringleaders, Pienaar and Spengler hauled three PAC men over the fence into the station yard. But when the gate was opened to bring in a fourth organizer, Dozens of demonstrators surged through it. The police staggered back amid a shower of stones. A black constable yelled: "Run! They are going to shoot!" Two shots rang out, followed by a deafening burst of gunfire. Stopped by the frantic shouting and arm waving of Spengler and Pienaar, the shooting lasted twenty seconds. But by then 743 bullets had been fired. Sixty-nine bodies lay dead on the ground outside the police station; 178 more were wounded. Over half the victims had been hit in the back while running away.
Ten minutes later a photographer took a picture of the scene, which appeared the next day in newspapers around the world. Showing a field full of corpses and two policemen armed with rifles looking on, it was the first image of South Africa to capture international attention; a repulsive impression of apartheid which was to remain in the collective conscience of the world for many years to come.
That was the first major incident in South Africa that was taken note of - perhaps because the world before then was at the same level as South Africa was in terms of values, or perhaps ignorance prevailed before then. After this incident there were many more that followed, each one bringing the western community to a higher awareness of the fascist institution which resided in South Africa.
Now from my point of view, I'm in a bit of a difficult situation. I share some of the sentiment of the oppressed - like LETS MAKE THOSE MOTHERFUCKERS PAY!!!!!!!!!! But then again, when referring to 'those mutherfuckers' I include myself to a certain extent because I am white and an ancestor of the racist regime.
I had a black girlfriend a bit more than a year ago. I found myself in some interesting situations with her. The stresses that were created in my family <Not my parents - they are very liberal and my old man used to be politically active> were unbearable at times. I took a drive in the country with her once an found myself in the older section of a town called Somerset West. I walked into a bar with her to make a fone call because we were lost, and we got some heavy looks with some hectic comments underbreath. So I left, and on my way out I looked up and saw a sign that said "Europeans only"-meaning all the NIGGERS can FUCK OFF. So I went next door to the 'non-european' bar and found the fone.
Now - this was in 1992, so things haven't changed much on this side of the world. But we are having our first democratic elections on the 26 of April - so we'll see what happens then.
~
As far as politics in cyberspace go in South Africa, well if you guys can get in here <Telnet/phreak/x25> at all, do so cause this place is extremely backward when it comes to hacking/phreaking related stuff. An article was published in South Africa's biggest computer magazine about 2 months ago about these 'Hackers' that are invading the datasphere (I guess those assholes missed Wargames).
Gibson wrote about the rape of third world countries' computer systems' by hackers in more advanced countries, so perhaps that'll come true some day if you guys start telnetting on over here and checking out the scene.
There are only two main networks in SA where politics exist in any form. The one is Beltel which is mostly a pickup joint for desperate lamers. The other is the Internet which is reserved at this stage <In South Africa> for the Universities. There are less than 5 BBS's in SA which have Internet access - and that's just Email access.
The only major hacking that goes on in SA is in the X25 service called SapoNet and UniNet <The university network - which is connected to the InterNet>. There are only about 10, maybe 15 people in South Africa who actually know their shit when it comes to H/P. There is the odd War3z d00d and War Games disciple to be found here and there, but thats about all there is.
If anyone would like to muck around with our networks, contact me or Aphex Twin and we'll provide you with the relevant addresses <If you're hacking thru'> or Numbers <If your phreaking through>.
pHaze....
Howzit to: Aphex, Tear, CyberCore, Maelstrom and Quetza. Fuck you's to: TonyHawk, TimeWiz and all the racists in SA!
