Under the leadership of Anton Lembede, the younger members like Nelson Mandela began the formidable task of transforming the African National Congress (ANC) into a mass movement by expanding it’s membership to include the millions of illiterate working people in the towns and countryside of South Africa. They formed the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL), Nelson Mandela proved to be a highly efficient organiser and tireless worker and was soon elected to the Secretaryship of the Youth League in 1947.
In 1948, the Afrikaner-dominated National Party won the all-white elections on it’s platform of apartheid racial segregation thus encouraging the ANC to accept the ANCYL methods of boycott, strike and civil disobedience as official policy. The party was becoming more militant, taking it’s lead from the younger more radical members. On this wave of change, Mandela was elected to the National Executive Committee (NEC) in 1950. The ANCYL programme also included attainment of full citizenship, direct parliamentary representation for all South Africans, the redistribution of land, trade union rights, compulsory education for children and mass literacy for adults.
One can only but be so impressed at their ambition, in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds they stood firm and stamped out their rights, astonishing really. Mandela was appointed as National Volunteer-in-Chief of the Defiance Campaign that the ANC unleashed in 1952. The Campaign was designed to begin with a small core of radical volunteers, from whom it would spread like wildfire to involve more and more ordinary people, eventually culminating in a mass, national defiance.
Russell Shortt is a travel consultant with Exploring Ireland, the leading specialists in customised, private escorted tours, escorted coach tours and independent self drive tours of Ireland.
Article source: Russell Shortt
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