Stephen Bantu Biko (18 December 1946 – 12 September 1977)
was an anti-
apartheid activist in
South Africa in the 1960s and 1970s.
A student leader, he later founded the
Black Consciousness Movement which would empower and mobilize much of the urban black population. Since his death in police custody, he has been called a
martyr of the anti-apartheid movement.
While living, his writings and activism attempted to empower black people, and he was famous for his slogan "black is beautiful", which he described as meaning: "man, you are okay as you are, begin to look upon yourself as a human being".
Despite friction between the
African National Congress and Biko throughout the 1970s the ANC has included Biko in the pantheon of struggle heroes, going as far as using his image for campaign posters in South Africa's first non-racial elections in 1994.
Early life
Biko was born to parents Mzimgayi Mathew and Alice Duman Biki in
King William's Town, in the present-day
Eastern Cape province of
South Africa.
His father was a government clerk, while his mother did domestic work in surrounding white homes.
The third of four children, Biko grew up with his older sister Bukelwa; his older brother Kahya; and his younger sister Nobandile.
In 1950, at the age of four, Biko suffered the loss of his father who was studying law.
As a child, he attended Brownlee Primary School and Charles Morgan Higher Primary School.
He was sent to Lovedale High School in 1964, a prestigious
boarding school in
Alice, Eastern Cape, where his older brother Kahya had previously been studying.
During the
Apartheid in South Africa, with no
freedom of association protection for non-
Afrikaner South African's, Biko was expelled from Lovedale for his political views, and his brother arrested for his alleged association with Poqo (now known as the
Azanian People's Liberation Army).
After being expelled, he then attended and later graduated from St. Francis College, a
Roman Catholic institution in
Mariannhill,
Natal.
He studied to be a doctor at the
University of Natal Medical School. Biko was a
Xhosa. In addition to
Xhosa, he spoke fluent
English and fairly fluent
Afrikaans.
He was initially involved with the multiracial
National Union of South African Students, but after he became convinced that Black,
Indian and
Coloured students needed an organization of their own, he helped found the
South African Students' Organisation (SASO), whose agenda included political self-reliance and the unification of university students in a "black consciousness."
In 1968 Biko was elected its first president. SASO evolved into the influential
Black Consciousness Movement (BCM). Biko was also involved with the
World Student Christian Federation.
Biko married Ntsiki Mashalaba in 1970.
They had two children together: Nkosinathi, born in 1971, and Samora. He also had two children with
Dr Mamphela Ramphele (a prominent activist within the BCM): a daughter, Lerato, born in 1974, who died of pneumonia when she was only two months old, and a son,
Hlumelo, who was born in 1978, after Biko's death.
Biko also had a daughter with Lorraine Tabane, named Motlatsi, born in May 1977.
In the early 1970s Biko became a key figure in
The Durban Moment.
In 1972 he was expelled from the University of Natal because of his political activities
and he became honorary president of the
Black People's Convention. He was
banned by the apartheid regime in February 1973,
meaning that he was not allowed to speak to more than one person at a time nor to speak in public, was restricted to the King William's Town magisterial district, and could not write publicly or speak with the media.
It was also forbidden to quote anything he said, including speeches or simple conversations.
When Biko was banned, his movement within the country was restricted to the Eastern Cape, where he was born. After returning there, he formed a number of grassroots organizations based on the notion of self-reliance: Zanempilo, the Zimele Trust Fund (which helped support former political prisoners and their families), Njwaxa Leather-Works Project and the Ginsberg Education Fund.
In spite of the repression of the
apartheid government, Biko and the BCM played a significant role in organising the protests which culminated in the
Soweto Uprising of 16 June 1976. In the aftermath of the uprising, which was crushed by heavily armed police shooting school children protesting, the authorities began to target Biko further.
Death and aftermath
On 18 August 1977, Biko was arrested at a police
roadblock under the
Terrorism Act No 83 of 1967 and interrogated by officers of the
Port Elizabeth security police including
Harold Snyman and
Gideon Nieuwoudt. This interrogation took place in the Police Room 619 of the Sanlam Building in Port Elizabeth. The interrogation lasted twenty-two hours and included torture and beatings resulting in a coma.
He suffered a major head injury while in police custody at the Walmer Police Station, in a suburb of Port Elizabeth, and was chained to a window grille for a day.
On 11 September 1977, police loaded him in the back of a
Land Rover, naked and restrained in manacles, and began the 1100 km drive to
Pretoria to take him to a prison with hospital facilities. He was nearly dead owing to the previous injuries.
He died shortly after arrival at the Pretoria prison, on 12 September. The police claimed his death was the result of an extended
hunger strike, but an autopsy revealed multiple bruises and abrasions and that he ultimately succumbed to a brain hemorrhage from the massive injuries to the head,
which many saw as strong evidence that he had been brutally clubbed by his captors. Then
Donald Woods, a journalist, editor and close friend of Biko's, along with
Helen Zille, later leader of the
Democratic Alliance political party, exposed the truth behind Biko's death.
Because of his high profile, news of Biko's death spread quickly, opening many eyes around the world to the brutality of the apartheid
regime. His funeral was attended by over 10,000 people, including numerous ambassadors and other diplomats from the United States and Western Europe. The
liberal white South African journalist
Donald Woods, a personal friend of Biko, photographed his injuries in the morgue. Woods was later forced to flee South Africa for England. Donald Woods later campaigned against apartheid and further publicised Biko's life and death, writing many newspaper articles and authoring the book,
Biko, which was later turned into the film
Cry Freedom.
Speaking at a National Party conference following the news of Biko's death then-minister of police, Jimmy Kruger said, "I am not glad and I am not sorry about Mr. Biko. It leaves me cold (Dit laat my koud). I can say nothing to you ... Any person who dies ... I shall also be sorry if I die."
