Page 111 - SARB: 100-Year Journey

The events at Sharpville sparked protest action elsewhere in the country. An estimated 30 000 people staged a similar protest to that which had taken place in Sharpville near Parliament in Cape Town. In response, the apartheid administration declared a state of emergency, banned political formations, including the ANC and the PAC, as well as detained about 11 000 people.
A diplomatic crisis ensued while political instability deepened. On the international front, South Africa’s continued membership to the Commonwealth came into question and structures such as the United Nations (UN) began to pay more attention to the situation in the country. Scholars of African history attribute the latter development to the wave of independence that hit the continent in the early 1960s. The rise in independent African states correlated with their increased representation at the UN.
Despite this, the apartheid machinery rolled on and intensified. Henshaw (1996, p 220) succinctly captures why this was the case from an economic point of view: “The growth of Afrikaner-dominated business indirectly brought more of the economy under what was equivalent to government control. Furthermore, South Africa had, after 1955, developed an effective money (i.e. short-term capital) market, thereby lessening the country’s dependence on the London market. Finally, the growing power and efficiency of the South African state had increased the government’s ability to control economic affairs (including the problem of capital flight) almost as thoroughly as affairs in any other sphere of South African life.”
Moreover, Henshaw (1996, p 220) argues: “National party governments could thus continue to benefit from long- standing economic bargains while pursuing political policies increasingly at odds with international opinion.”
That explains why “... [Verwoerd] ... was able to resist pressure for political change applied indirectly by domestic and overseas holders of capital. The Verwoerd government stemmed the flight of capital (that began with Sharpeville and continued as the country moved towards a republic and departure from the Commonwealth) by applying, for the first time, strict controls on any movement of capital out of South Africa, including capital owned by other sterling area residents.” (Henshaw, 1996, p 220).
Winnie Mandela (centre) leaves the Palace of Justice in Pretoria on 12 June 1964 with her fist clenched, after the verdict of the Rivonia Trial was given, sentencing eight men, including her husband, Nelson Mandela, to life imprisonment. The men were charged with conspiracy, sabotage and treason. /OFF/AFP via Getty Images
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