Stave Biko: 1 Wile What Like, A sefection of his writinga! Pbk 95p
IT IS now two years since Steve Biko was murdered in a South African jail. Although his family have been offered compensation — in itself an admission of guilt by the white authorities — no one has yet been arrested and charged with the crime.
In this, as in other aspects, there is a remarkable parallel with Malcolm X leader of the American whose murder also still goes the great unavenged
The publication of this selection of Steve Biko's writings makes it very clear why the apartheid regime wanted to get rid of him. For, just as Malcolm X became the authentic voice of Blacks in the US, Steve Biko was voicing the aspirations of the new generation of the South African which led the Soweto revolt.
Nationalism
Writing "On Theses' 1935, Leon 'Trotsky chastised the drafters of the theses because they regarded the siogan of a "black republic' as 'equally harmful for the revolutionary cause as is the slogan of a South Africa for the whites' wrote Trotsky is the case of supporting complete oppression .. The former is... taking the first steps The latter, toward liberation.' broke (South African tion), a Black student body.
Steve Biko took these 'first step toward liberation' when, in 1968 hr the white-dominated "liberal'. NUSAS (National Union of South African Students) to form SASO Students OrganisaFrom 1969-72 he was active in the of which he is regarded as the 'father'. To anyone who wants to understand this movement. these writings are a must.
Although it is probable that Biko never read these lines of Trotsky's, his Black Consciousness Black Consciousness definition . Ot coincides exactly statement: Trotsky's "Merely by describing yourself as black you have started on you yourself to fight against all forces that seek to use your blackness as a stamp that marks you the road towards emancipation, committed out as a subservient being.'