Stop the hangings

Memorandum drawing attention to the steep rise in death sentences for political offences in South Africa. The memorandum made detailed proposals for intervention by the British government and asked it to initiate action by the UN Security Council, the European Economic Community and the Commonwealth.

Leaflet publicising a demonstration on the day of the expected court hearing of the Sharpeville Six’s appeal on 10 September 1987. The hearing was delayed until November. The six, five men and one woman, were sentenced to death in December 1985 after joining a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. The appeal was rejected and they were held on death row for ten more months until they were reprieved in July 1988. The action was organised by the London AA Committee with support from trade unions and anti-racist groups.

SATIS (Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society) collected signatures to this Declaration demanding that the South African Government withdraw the death sentences imposed on the Sharpeville Six. The six, five men and one woman, were sentenced to death in December 1985 after joining a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. The Declaration was circulated in the run-up to the appeal against the death sentences, scheduled for 10 September 1987. The appeal was rejected but the six were reprieved in July 1988.

Poster produced for the campaign to save the lives of the Sharpeville Six, sentenced to death after joining a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. The six were reprieved in July 1988 after spending two and a half years on death row. 

Leaflet for a demonstration outside South Africa House publicising the case of the Sharpeville Six. The six, five men and one woman, were sentenced to death in December 1985 after joining a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. For the next two and a half years Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society (SATIS) mounted an international campaign for their release. As a result of the campaign and protests from inside South Africa, they were reprieved in July 1988.

The Sharpeville Six, five men and one woman, were sentenced to death in December 1985 after joining a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. For the next two and a half years Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society (SATIS) mounted an international campaign for their release. As a result of the campaign and protests from inside South Africa, the Six were reprieved in July 1988. This was an updated version of a pamphlet first produced in 1986.

The apartheid government escalated its repression of trade unionists in 1988 – four trade union leaders were sentenced to death and hundreds were detained. In response the AAM and SATIS (Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society) launched a campaign to defend trade unionists in South Africa and Namibia. It was launched at a demonstration outside the South African Embassy on 1 February 1988 on the day the trial of Moses Mayekiso, General Secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers (NUMSA) reopened in Johannesburg.

Letter from Lynda Chalker, Minister of State at the Foreign Office, telling the AAM Women‘s Committee that the British government had asked the South African government to commute the death sentences on the Sharpeville Six. One of the six was a woman, Theresa Ramashamola. The six were condemned to death for taking part in a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. They were eventually reprieved in July 1988 after spending two and a half years on death row.