Apartheid: Racial Segregation In South Africa

Apartheid, a word meaning "separateness", or "the state of being apart “was a system of racial segregation in South Africa which was enforced through legislation by the National party, which was the governing party from 1948 to 1994. Under apartheid, the rights, associations, and movements of the majority black people and other groups were curtailed, and white minority rule was maintained. Apartheid was developed after World War 2 by the Afrikaner-dominated National Party. The idea was also enforced into South West Africa which was administered by South Africa under the League of nations mandate until it gained independence as Namibia in 1990. By extension, the term is currently used for forms of segregation established by the state authority

The non-white political representation was abolished in the 1970, and starting in that year, the black people were deprived of their citizenship, legally becoming citizens of one of 10 tribally based self-governing homelands, four of which became independent states. The government segregated education, medical care, beaches, and other public services and provided black people with services that were inferior to white people. Apartheid sparked significant internal resistance of violence. Starting in the 1950s, a series of popular uprisings and protests resulted in a retaliatory ban and the imprisonment of anti-apartheid leaders. Along with the sanctions placed on South Africa by the international community, this made it increasingly difficult for the government to maintain the regime. Apartheid reformed in the 1980s and failed to the mounting the

South Africa was formally expelled from the International Olympic Committee in 1970 which was ten years after last competing at the showpiece of international sport. The country was suspended from football’s world body Fifa in 1961. After a visit to the country by the English president of Fifa, Stanley Rous, the suspension was lifted and South African football officials suggested they send an all-white team to the 1966 World Cup in England, and an all-black one to Mexico four years later. Not surprisingly, this idea was rejected and the suspension imposed. In 1976, after police shot and killed unarmed school pupils protesting the use of Afrikaans in schools, Fifa expelled the white Football Association of South Africa. Thereafter the pressure on the South African government increased at all levels and sport being one of them. Internally, protest was led by the non-racial South African Council on Sport, while externally it was the exiled South African Non-Racial Olympic Committee that was in the forefront of organizing resistance to the racist sports policies of the apartheid