South Africa has commemorated the Sharpeville Massacre of 1960.
Fifty years ago, the Sharpeville Massacre drew international condemnation when sixty-nine people were gunned down by police, acting on the instructions of the apartheid government.
The dead have been honoured with church services as part of Human Rights Day.
Many people gathered at the Roman Catholic church in Sharpeville to lay wreaths on the graves of those shot down by police, as they were trying through fear to run away.
Demonstrators had gathered outside the police station on the day of the massacre to protest against pass laws, which required all blacks to carry identity documents at all times.
No police were ever convicted over the killings, however, the Sharpeville massacre forced political activists to start an underground armed resistance in South Africa, which eventually became the ANC; the party of Nelson Mandela.
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Sharpeville massacre commemorated Written when Mandela was imprisoned
You have thwarted my ambitions
And scorned my life’s accomplishments
You have denied me dignity
And my freedom you have stolen
But know me, my brother
I will never yield
I feel the wrath of your anger
And the arrogance of your might
I know your venom, and your hate
And the horror in your madness
Though I fear, my brother
I must never yield
Harden your ears when people wail
Their mis’ry and desolation
To see the broken child-bodies
Sacrificed to your racist cause
But hear me my brother
I shall never yield
Though I shed bitter tears of rage
And despair eats my very soul
I have visions of brotherhood
Where all peoples are as one
And for this, my brother
I can never yield |
