A rare clip of Teboho "Tsietsi" Macdonald Mashinini, the Student Leader of the 1976 Soweto Uprising.
The apartheid government imposed Afrikaans as a compulsory teaching language in native African schools. Irate by that, est. 20000 students hit the streets, with hundreds killed.
The life of Teboho "Tsietsi" Macdonald Mashinini, by The Sowetan.
[Video continues below.]
Teboho Mashinini was South Africa's most wanted man at this time; interviewed in hiding by reporter John Fielding in September 1976 on the June Uprising.
He gave close-up gory details on the massacre that followed, disputing official accounts on the number of students killed.
There is no question that the Soweto Uprising galvanized the anti-apartheid movement, emboldened the ANC, and it was never quiet until Mandela was released and apartheid was scrapped.
Teboho Mashinini, being hunted by the government, escaped, traveling to Botswana, Nigeria, Liberia—got married to Miss Liberia 1977— and Guinea staying at Miriam Makeba's home to continue his activism.
He died under mysterious circumstances in 1990 at Guinea, possibly homicide.
Monuments in his name.
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