Tyneside AA Group asked spectators to boycott Shell products at Newcastle upon Tyne’s May Day carnival in1989.
‘Don’t Buy South African goods’ was the message on Tyneside AA Group’s float at Newcastle upon Tyne’s May Day carnival in 1989. Local anti-apartheid supporters were asking spectators to support the AAM’s ‘Boycott Apartheid 89’ campaign.
Trade unionists from Teesside and Hartlepool protested against the unloading of South African coal at Teesport in north-east England on 11 May 1989. British miners and other trade unionists were at the forefront of the campaign against imports of South African coal. By the late 1980s the international campaign meant that it was often sold at a discounted price.
This Wales AAM supporter was asking passers-by not to buy products from South Africa. He was taking part in a demonstration outside the Holiday Inn in Cardiff. The Holiday Inn group had a chain of hotels in South Africa. The AAM’s countrywide Boycott Apartheid 89 campaign focused on tourism and imports of coal and gold, as well as wine and fruit.
Sheffield MP Richard Caborn and Lord Mayor Tony Damms with Sheffield AAM supporters outside Tesco on 13 October 1989. Over 2,000 shoppers signed Sheffield AA Group’s petition asking Tesco to stop selling South African goods. Earlier in the year, 320 of Tesco 380 stores all over Britain were picketed in a special Day of Action on 22 April.
Operation Orange was an AAM fundraising initiative designed to promote the consumer boycott campaign. This leaflet asked people to send a message to Prime Minister Thatcher asking her to impose sanctions against South Africa. At the same time it asked them to send a donation to the Anti-Apartheid Movement.
The AAM’s ‘Boycott Apartheid 89’ campaign extended the consumer boycott to tourism. London students and the London Anti-Apartheid Committee called for South Africa to be excluded from the World Travel Market at Kensington’s Olympia exhibition centre, 28 November 1989. The AAM wrote to the ten top British travel agents asking them not to book holidays in South Africa.
This booklet was produced by the London Borough of Lambeth in south London. It gave advice to Lambeth residents on how to check if goods on sale in local shops came from South Africa or Namibia. It was carefully worded so as not to break new laws restricting the powers of local authorities to support consumer boycott campaigns.
