South African History Timeline (Part 2)

Events 201 - 400 of 639

• 1921-11-21 The trial of the accused of the Bulhoek Massacre commences in South Africa
• 1921-12-16 The Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA) calls for a united front in a pass burning campaign on Dingaan's Day
• 1922-01-01 Coal miners in the Transvaal, South Africa, embark on a strike in response to a wage cut, which quickly escalated into a large-scale revolt against the government, known as the Rand Rebellion.

• 1922-03-10 State of siege proclaimed during mine strike Johannesburg, South Africa
• 1923-05-31 The South African Indian Congress (SAIC) forms in Durban, South Africa, with Omar Hajee Amod Jhaveri as President
• 1923-09-12 Britain takes over Southern Rhodesia from British South Africa Co.
• 1924-01-27 The Natal Indian Congress and the Natal Indian Association jointly organise a mass meeting in Durban, South Africa in opposition to the Class Areas Bill
• 1924-02-15 A deputation for the South African Indian Congress (SAIC) meets with the Minister of the Interior, Sir Patrick Duncan, and presents him with a memorandum setting out their objections concerning the Class Areas Bill
• 1924-04-01 Crown takes over Northern Rhodesia from British South Africa Co
• 1924-04-08 South African State pass the Industrial Conciliation Act No 11: provides for job reservation, excluded blacks from membership of registered trade unions, prohibited registration of black trade unions
• 1924-06-16 South Africa all out 30 v England in 48 minutes, Gilligan 6-7
• 1924-06-30 England score 2-503 in day's play v South Africa at Lord's

• 1925-05-05 Afrikaans is established as an official language in South Africa
• 1925-06-16 The Union Government rejects a round-table conference with India on the grounds that it will constitute interference in South African affairs
• 1926-05-31 Kruger National Park is established as South Africa's first national park
• 1926-07-18 The South Africa author and journalist, Herman Charles Bosman, shoots and kills his stepbrother David Russell during a quarrel
• 1926-08-22 Gold discovered in Johannesburg, South Africa
• 1930-05-19 White women win voting rights in South Africa
• 1931-09-30 Start of "Die Voortrekkers" youth movement for Afrikaners in Bloemfontein, South Africa.
• 1931-12-11 Statute of Westminster gives complete legislative independence to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland (Free State), and Newfoundland (not then part of Canada)
• 1932-01-30 Clarrie Grimmett 7-116 in South Africa 1st innings at Adelaide Oval
• 1932-02-02 Australian spin bowler Clarrie Grimmett takes 14 wickets v South Africa (7-116 & 7-83)
• 1936-01-04 Clarrie Grimmett becomes world record wicket taker with number 190 v South Africa
• 1936-03-03 Clarrie Grimmett ends his Test career with 13 wkts in 5th Test v South Africa

• 1938-06-08 Gert Terblanche, a local school boy, discovers fossils of an unknown 'robust-type' human ancestor, later named Paranthropus robustus by Robert Broom, at Kromdraai, Blaauwbank River Valley in South Africa
• 1938-07-01 The South African Press Association (SAPA) is established as a non-governmental institution by South Africa's major newspapers to facilitate the sharing of news, both national and international
• 1938-08-08 Great Trek Centenary Celebrations commence; the Great Trek was a migration involving Boers leaving the Cape Colony and settling in the interior of South Africa
• 1938-12-23 Discovery of the first modern coelacanth in South Africa
• 1939-03-14 England draw with South Africa at Durban on the 10th day
• 1939-09-03 World War II: Britain declares war on Germany after invasion of Poland. France follows 6 hours later quickly joined by Australia, New Zealand, South Africa & Canada
• 1939-09-05 J. B. M. Hertzog resigns as South African Prime Minister after losing a vote in parliament on neutrality in WWII
• 1939-09-06 South Africa declares war on Nazi-Germany
• 1940-06-22 About 10,000 Afrikaner women march to the union buildings in protest of South Africa's involvement in WWII
• 1941-12-01 British cruiser HMS Dorsetshire forces crew of German submarine supply ship MV Python to scuttle vessel in the South Atlantic 1,150 miles west of South Africa

• 1946-06-23 In South Africa, a group of white men attack and assault Indian Passive Resisters
• 1947-06-23 Compton and Bill Edrich make 370 stand for 3rd wkt v South Africa

• 1948-05-26 South Africa elects a nationalist government under D. F. Malan with an apartheid policy
• 1949-01-14 Black and Indian race rebellion in Durban, South Africa; 142 die
• 1949-03-09 England beat South Africa by scoring 174 runs in 94 minutes
• 1949-07-08 South Africa's Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act commences, prohibiting marriage or a sexual relationship between White people and people of other races [1]
• 1950-04-27 South Africa passes Group Areas Act segregating races
• 1950-06-13 South African parliament accept "Groups Area Act"
• 1950-06-27 South Africa heeds United Nations call to assist Korea
• 1950-07-17 Suppression of Communism Act comes into force in South Africa
• 1951-05-31 Netherlands & South Africa sign cultural accord
• 1951-06-18 In South Africa, the Suppression of Communism Act commences
• 1952-03-24 Great demonstrations against apartheid in South Africa

• 1953-04-15 Malans National Party wins South African elections
• 1953-06-09 South African premier D. F. Malan visits the Netherlands
• 1953-07-15 ANC members, Walter Sisulu and Duma Nokwe leave South Africa and go overseas under false names
• 1954-07-12 ANC President Albert Luthuli banned by South African Minister of Justice from attending public gatherings and confined to the magisterial district of Lower Tugela, Natal
• 1954-08-01 South African Natives Resettlement Act comes into being, empowers the Government to remove Africans from any area within and next to the magisterial district of Johannesburg
• 1954-11-30 John Strydom succeeds D. F. Malan as premier of South Africa
• 1955-06-26 Freedom Charter signed in South Africa
• 1955-11-09 UN disapproves of South Africa's apartheid politics
• 1956-07-10 Solomon Kalushi Mahlangu, Mamelodi, east of Pretoria, South Africa, a soldier of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the ANC
• 1956-08-09 South African women demonstrate against pass laws
• 1956-08-17 One of the largest demonstrations in South Africa's history, 20,000 women marched to Pretoria's Union Buildings to present petition against carrying of passes by women to the Prime Minister
• 1956-12-06 Nelson Mandela & 156 others arrested for political activities in South Africa
• 1957-05-22 South Africa's government approves race separation in universities
• 1958-03-14 South Africa's government prohibits the African National Congress
• 1958-09-02 Hendrik Verwoerd appointed Prime Minister of South Africa
• 1959-06-16 South African Apartheid government efforts to remove Black people from Cato Manor close to the Durban city center to newly established black township Kwa Mashu, on outskirts met with violent resistance
• 1959-08-12 Progressive Party under John Steytler forms in South Africa
• 1959-11-17 De Beers firm of South Africa announces synthetic diamond
• 1960-01-01 A photograph of a South African boy in a torn vest is published in the Daily Herald; it was illegal to employ a 'native' under 18 in the mines under the Native Labour Regulation Act
• 1960-01-21 Rock falls traps 437 at Coalbrook, South Africa; 417 die of methane poisoning

• 1960-03-21 Sharpeville Massacre: Police kill 72 in South Africa & outlaws ANC
• 1960-04-09 South African Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd survives an assassination attempt by David Pratt despite being twice shot in the face
• 1960-06-06 South African police kill 11 Pondo's at Nqusa Hill
• 1960-06-24 Geoff Griffin takes a hat-trick South Africa v England Lord's
• 1960-08-08 Charges against 53 of the 76 Africans detained after the Sharpeville massacre in South Africa are dropped
• 1961-03-15 South Africa withdraws from British Commonwealth
• 1961-03-17 South Africa leaves British Commonwealth
• 1961-05-04 South Africa ANC leader John Nkadimeng arrested
• 1961-05-31 Union of South Africa becomes a republic, leaves Commonwealth
• 1961-06-27 Ghana imposes a total ban on exports to South Africa and South West Africa
• 1961-06-29 The International Labour Organisation (ILO) calls for South Africa's withdrawal at the Geneva Conference in protest of the racial policies of the South African government
• 1961-08-24 Former South African nazi leader Johannes Vorster becomes South Africa's minister of justice
• 1961-12-08 South Africa v NZ, Durban debuts for Eddie Barlow & Peter Pollock
• 1962-06-15 South Africa passes a bill setting death penalty for many crimes
• 1962-06-27 In South Africa, the General Law Amendment Act (Sabotage Act) No 76 commences, increasing the state president's power to declare organisations unlawful and to add further restrictions to banning orders
• 1962-08-04 Nelson Mandela captured by South African police
• 1962-08-05 Nelson Mandela arrested for incitement and for illegally leaving South Africa
• 1962-11-06 UN General Assembly adopts resolution condemning South Africa
• 1963-06-25 Curnick Ndlovu, South African worker's union leader and African National Congress Leader, is arrested for acts of sabotage
• 1963-06-30 International Labour Organisation excludes South Africa from its two-day meeting because of its apartheid policies
• 1963-07-06 South African workers' union leader Billy Nair arrested
• 1963-07-11 South-African ANC members Walter Sisulu, Andrew Mlangeni and Govan Mbeki arrested
• 1963-07-13 Indian government announces it will cut last remaining links with South Africa by refusing landing facilities to South African aircraft
• 1963-07-18 The United Nations Special Committee on Apartheid releases its second interim report pressing for international sanctions against South Africa, particularly the supply of arms, ammunition and petroleum
• 1963-08-11 Four ANC political detainees escape from Pretoria Central prison in South Africa
• 1963-10-20 South Africa begins trial of Nelson Mandela & 8 others on conspiracy charges
• 1963-12-07 Ian Meckiff no-balled for throwing against the South Africans

• 1964-06-24 In South Africa, the 90-Days Act commences, providing for any person to be detained, without trial, for 90 days; further, the person could be re-arrested under the same law for another 90 days
• 1964-07-17 ANC leader Nelson Mandela, recently sentenced to life imprisonment, is awarded the Joliot Curie Gold Medal for Peace
• 1964-10-04 3 cars of a commuter train derails in South Africa killing 81
• 1964-11-17 British Labour Party installs weapon embargo against South Africa
• 1965-01-06 Geoff Boycott takes 3-47 against South Africa, his best Test bowling
• 1965-04-01 South Africa worker's union leader Henry Fazzie sentenced to 10 years
• 1965-06-15 South Africa begins economic boycott of Dutch products
• 1965-07-03 Harold Strachan, member of the Communist Party of South Africa and Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the African National Congress, is served with a restriction order in terms of the Suppression of Communism Act
• 1965-12-01 South Africa's government says children of white fathers are white
• 1966-03-17 South Africa's government bans Defense & Aid Fund
• 1966-05-01 Radio RSA, South Africa begins shortwave transmitting
• 1966-06-22 South African Bishop Alphaeus Hamilton Zulu, is refused a passport and thus permission to attend an international church conference by the South African government
• 1966-07-16 Number of banned persons in South Africa totals 936; the individuals are banned under various laws, most prominently the Suppression of Communism and Riotous Assembly Acts
• 1966-08-03 South African government bans records by The Beatles

• 1966-09-13 Johannes Balthazar Vorster sworn in as premier of South Africa
• 1966-10-27 UN deprives South Africa of Namibia
• 1967-05-23 Government bans submarines near South Africa

• 1968-04-20 South African Airways Boeing 707 crashes at Windhoek, 122 killed
• 1968-07-29 Gram Parsons refuses to play with the Byrds in South Africa
• 1969-06-30 In South Africa, General Laws Amendment Bill is passed; the Bill contains far-reaching provisions and restrictions affecting the administration of justice and the disclosure of evidence
• 1970-01-01 The University College of Zululand, formerly affiliated to the University of South Africa, attains full academic autonomy as the University of Zululand.
• 1970-03-10 South Africa cricket team complete 4-0 series drubbing of Australia in South Africa, in the country's last official international cricket test for 22 years
• 1970-08-13 Pamphlet bombs which scatter revolutionary African National Congress propaganda leaflets explode in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban and Port Elizabeth, South Africa
• 1970-08-19 The Chinese Community in South Africa is granted 'White' status
• 1971-01-23 Britain allowed to sell arms to South Africa, after Commonwealth Conference in Singapore ends in compromise

• 1971-03-31 South Africa national debt hits 5.45 billion
• 1971-06-21 International Court of Justice asks South Africa to pull out of Namibia
• 1971-06-22 Pretoria court rules that the former leader of the banned Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), Robert Sobukwe, will not be allowed to use his exit permit to leave South Africa for study in the United States
• 1972-01-01 Policewomen are enlisted as full members of South African Police Force for the first time.
• 1972-06-01 Tswanaland becomes Bophuthatswana in South Africa
• 1972-07-03 Themba Sono is forced to resign as president of South African Student Organisation (SASO)
• 1972-07-12 Twelve years after the banning of the ANC and Pan Africanist Congress, a new political movement, the Black People Convention is formed after a three day long conference in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa
• 1972-09-30 Passenger train derails killing 48 (Rust Stasie, South Africa)
• 1973-11-23 Arab summit conference adopts open and secret resolutions on the use of the oil weapons; embargo extended to Portugal, Rhodesia, and South Africa
• 1974-01-01 With effect from this date the New Zealand government terminates all tariff preferences previously granted to South Africa
• 1974-06-01 Arab oil ministers decide to end most restrictions on exports of oil to the United States but continue embargo against the Netherlands, Portugal, South Africa, and Rhodesia
• 1974-11-12 South Africa suspended from UN General Assembly over racial policies
• 1975-07-27 The British government closes its consulate in Angola following increasing fighting between the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola and South African troops
• 1975-10-23 Battle between Cuba & South Africa troops in Angola
• 1976-03-12 South African troops leave Angola
• 1976-06-11 Anti-apartheid advocate Dumisa Ntsebeza arrested in South Africa
• 1976-06-16 Soweto Uprising: Over 10,000 students in Soweto, South Africa, march against the use of Afrikaans as a medium of instruction in Black secondary schools; clashes with police kills dozens
• 1976-06-24 A Principal's office in Hlengisi Primary, Nyanga, outside Cape Town, South Africa, is burnt down; part of the broader resistance against the oppressive new Bantu Education policy of Afrikaans as a teaching medium in their schools
• 1976-06-25 Soweto Uprising: in South Africa leaves an estimated 200 to 700 blacks and 2 whites dead following 10 days of rioting
• 1976-06-27 In South Africa, the National President of the Black People's Convention, Kenneth Hlaku Rachidi, declares that riots in Soweto have lead to a new era of political consciousness
• 1976-07-17 21st modern Olympic games opens in Montreal: 25 African teams (later rising to 33 nations) boycott the games due to New Zealand playing rugby in apartheid South Africa
• 1976-08-11 Race riot in Cape Town, South Africa; 17 die
• 1976-08-13 South Africa pledges support for a negotiated settlement in Rhodesia
• 1976-09-23 South Africa decides to allow multi-racial teams to represent them
• 1976-10-26 Transkei gains independence, not recognized outside of South Africa
• 1976-11-09 UN General Assembly condemns apartheid in South Africa
• 1976-12-28 Winnie Mandela banished in South Africa
• 1977-04-27 Bloody riots in Soweto, South Africa
• 1977-06-10 International Labour Organisation and United Nations meet to discuss apartheid in South Africa and potential actions to prevent further violence and state repression.
• 1977-06-23 Violence erupts in Soweto, South Africa, again and the police make at least 146 arrests
• 1977-06-28 The United Party, main political opposition party in South Africa, is formally disbanded by the majority faction after members leave the party to join other new political parties
• 1977-06-29 South Africa opposition party, the New Republic Party (NRP), is formed after the integration of the United Party (UP) and Democratic Party (DP)
• 1977-07-26 The 'Committee of 10' formed by prominent Soweto residents, issues a programme for the election of a new community board to have total autonomy in Soweto, South Africa
• 1977-08-10 About 100 white sympathisers joined evicted black squatters in a protest against the demolition of shanty dwellings outside Cape Town, South Africa
• 1977-08-18 South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko is arrested at a roadblock (dies of police beating 12 September)
• 1977-09-14 Christmas Tinto sentenced to 7 years in Robben Island, South Africa
• 1977-10-21 US recalls William Bowdler, ambassador to South Africa
• 1977-11-04 UN Security council proclaims weapon embargo against South Africa
• 1977-12-06 South Africa grants Bophuthatswana independence
• 1977-12-31 Donald Woods, a banned anti-Apartheid white editor flees South Africa
• 1978-01-01 News editor Donald Woods finally arrives in London after escaping the apartheid regime in South Africa
• 1978-05-06 South Africa military goes into Angola

• 1979-09-13 South Africa grants Venda independence (Not recognized out of South Africa)
• 1980-03-27 Elevator in Vaal Reefs gold mine, South Africa plunges more than 1900m killing all 23 miners aboard
• 1980-06-01 ANC sets fire to Sasol oil installations in South Africa
• 1980-06-13 UN Security Council calls for South Africa to free Nelson Mandela
• 1980-06-18 Dutch 2nd Chamber joins oil boycott of South Africa
• 1980-06-23 South African Prime Minister P. W. Botha warns the country that confrontation will be inevitable if his proposed President's Council fails
• 1980-08-22 Leaders of Port Elizabeth's Black secondary school children in South Africa decided to end a four month boycott of classes
• 1981-06-19 Heaviest known orange (2.5 kg) exhibited, Nelspruit, South Africa
• 1981-06-30 Zwelakhe Sisulu, President of the Black Media Workers Association of South Africa, is detained
• 1981-08-08 At a summit South African Trade Unions resolve to defy apartheid and labour laws
• 1981-11-25 Failed coup by South African mercenaries in Seychelles
• 1981-11-30 South Africa anti-apartheid advocate Bulelani Ngcuka arrested
• 1981-12-04 According to South Africa, Ciskei gains independence. Not recognized as an independent country outside South Africa.
• 1982-03-20 Rev Andries Treurnicht forms Conservative Party of South Africa
• 1982-06-25 South African President P. W. Botha issues a new Proclamation again placing Ingwavuma under government control
• 1982-07-02 In South Africa, the Internal Security Act is passed, giving massive powers to the authorities to investigate any organization or publication
• 1982-08-06 Three ANC members are sentenced to death in South Africa
• 1982-08-11 The South African Defence Force (SADF) raids Southern Angola
• 1983-07-13 The Transvaal Attorney General announces that Eugène Terre'Blanche, leader of the far-right Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) and three associates will face terrorism charges, South Africa
• 1983-08-06 Bomb planted by Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of ANC, explodes at a synagogue in Johannesburg, South Africa
• 1983-08-06 Supertanker Castillo de Bellvar catches fire and sinks northwest of Capetown, South Africa
• 1983-08-20 The South African anti-apartheid umbrella organization, United Democratic Front (UDF) is launched at Rocklands Community Centre in Cape Town, South Afrca
• 1983-09-27 South African worker's union leader Curnick Ndlovu freed from prison after 19 years
• 1984-02-27 Worker's union leader Billy Nair freed in South Africa
• 1984-03-16 South Africa & Mozambique sign non attack treaty
• 1984-05-12 South African prisoner Nelson Mandela sees his wife Winnie Mandela for the 1st time in 22 years
• 1984-06-28 Former member of South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU), Jeannette Schoon, and her six-year-old daughter, Katryn, are killed by a letter bomb at Lubango, in northern Angola

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