South Africa: The Prisoners, The Banned and the Banished - II: Mrs. Helen Joseph

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Alternative title Notes and Documents - United Nations Centre Against ApartheidNo. 15/69 Author/Creator United Nations Centre against Apartheid Publisher Department of Political and Security Council Affairs Date 1969-10-00 Resource type Reports Language English Subject Coverage (spatial) South Africa Coverage (temporal) 1969 Source Northwestern University Libraries Description In resolution 2396 (XXIII) of 2 December 1968, the General Assembly requested the Secretary-General to establish and publicize a "register of persons executed, imprisoned, placed under house arrest or banning orders or deported for their opposition to apartheid." In response to this provision and related requests by the Special Committee on Apartheid, the Unit has initiated a series of "Notes and Documents" giving particulars concerning such persons. This issue highlights Mrs. Helen Joseph. Format extent 8 page(s) (length/size)

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UNIT ON APARTHEID DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL AND SECURITY COUNCIL AFFAIRS NOTES AND DOCUMENTS* October 1969 SOUTH AFRICA: THE PRISONERS, THE BANNED AND THE BANISHED- II MRS. HELEN JOSEPH "Those...who are critical of the manner in which our country is 'misrepresented' and 'maligned' abroad would do well to consider the facts abour Mrs. Helen Joseph." - Mr. Leo Marquard in Cape Times, 22 September 1967. "...this spectacle of this Government, this strong Government, relentlessly pursuing and hounding a woman of sixty in this way is despicable and brings no credit to South Africa in the eyes of the outside world." r6 . j7 on P;:otrejiVe P..rty Mcber cf Farlianent, in the House of Ascbly on February 8, 1968. (In resolution 2396 (XXIII) of 2 December 1968, the General Assembly requested the Secretary-General to establish and publicize a "register of persons executed, imprisoned, placed under house arrest or banning orders or deported for their opposition to apartheid." In response to this provision and related requests by the Vpecial Committee on Apartheid, the Unit has initiated a series of "Notes and Documents" giving particulars concerning such persons). *All material in these notes and documents may be freely reprinted. Acknowledgement, together with a copy of the publication containing the reprint, would be appreciated. r:o. 15,' 9

Seven years under house arrest On October 13, it will be seven years since Mrs. Helen Joseph was put under "house arrest" in South Africa, the first person to be subjected to such arbitrary and cruel punishment for opposition to apartheid. Mrs. Joseph, a social worker, has been charged many times for her activities in opposition to racial discrimination, but the Government could never obtain a conviction, despite its armoury of repressive laws, except once for being late to report to the police. She has suffered these seven years under arbitrary orders of the Minister of Justice without reasons, without charges and without trial. She has been confined to her small home in Fanny Avenue, Norwood, Johannesburg, without visiiors, from 6.30 p.m. to 6.50 a.m. cvery night, from 2.30 p.m. on Saturday to 6.30 a.m. on Monday and all day on public-holidays (except that she tns been allowed since December -1967 to leave the house fcr two and a half hours on Sundays to attend high mass at the church). She cannot have any visitors at home except a doctor in an emergency. (An appeal by the St. Mary's Cathedral in 1967 to allow visits by a priest were rejected by the Minister of Justice). She cannot leave Johannesburg, or attend any meetings or communicate with any of the lundreds of other persons bannned for their opposition to *partheid. She cannot enter the premises of any newspaper, factory, trade union or educational instituion, nor can she write for publication. She has to report daily in person to the Marshall Square police station between noon and 2. p.m. Any infraction, however accidental, would subject her to prosecution and imprisonment--if she is late at the police station or at home, or if she talked to someone without knowing that he was banned. As a correspondent wrote to the Cape Times (9 November 1967): "Have your readers ever bothered to imagine what it must be like never to talk to anyone normally; to report daily to the police; to struggle back to your confined domicile by 6 p.m.; never to attend church or concert, play or cinema; never play bridge or tennis; never walk, never discuss recipes or books; never visit a dressmaker; never have a week-end away from the city-and meet no. one but yourself for 12 hours each day? "You might stand it for a week, but it takes great strength of character not to collapse under the strain, when there appears no hope of justice. And to have all your creative thought and work killed and forbidden publication?"

-2- A leader in struge against apartheid Mrs. Helen Beatrice May Joseph, born in England, went to South Africa in 1931 after a brief period of teaching at a girls' school in Hyderabad, India. She taught in Durban until the Second World War when she enlisted as a welfare officer in Women's Auxiliary Air Force. After the war, she worked with the National War Memorial Health Foundation among the Coloured people in the Cape. Moving to Johannesburg in 1952 as secretary of the Medical Aid Society of the non-racial Garment Workers' Union, with 20,000 members, she became involved in the protests by women of all races against the increasingly discriminatory measures of the Government. She was elected national secretary of the Feder~tion of South African Women and Vice-President of the Congress of Democrats, an organization of whites allied to the African National Congress. She was a prominent leader in the nation-wide demonstrations against the law requiring passes for African women. She helped organize the "Congress of the People" in 1955, at which the "Freedom Charter" was adopted. In 1959, she was appointed by the African National Congress to serve on a Welfare Committee for Africans banished without any trial. She travelled thousands of miles to visit dozens of those banished to remote and barren parts of the country, and arranged to feed and clothe them. Persecuted since 1956 Because of these activities, she has been subjected to constant persecution. She was one of the 156 leaders arrested in 1956 and charged with treason. The trial dragged on for four years and five months, and all the accused were acquitted. While on trial, she was served with banning orders in 1957 prohibiting her from attending gatherings or leaving Johannesburg for five years. She was detained under the emergency regulations for five months in 1960. On October 13, 1962, she was placed under house arrest for five years: this was widely condemned as a reprisal for her activity on behalf of the banished Africans. Thirteen women (twelve Africans and one white) serenaded her home to protest against the Government: they were arrested and fined 20 to 40 Rand. Mr. Nelson Mandela, leader of the African National Congress, wrote to her from prison: "I join the millions of democrats here and abroad in condemning the cruel and cowardly order of house arrest imposed on you by the Minister -of Justice. Courage never failed you in the past. It will not fail you now when all signs point unmistakably to the early defeat of all regimes based on force and violence. "You and I, and indeed the millions of freedom fighters in the country, cannot afford to take this challenge lying down."

-3- Mrs. Joseph was arrested in March 1963, as she was late on one day in reporting to the police station. She was sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment, all but four days suspended for a year. She was again charged with furthering the aims of African National Congress after it was banned in 1960, and with possession of banned literature, but was acquitted on 18 August 1964. In PF,.bruary 1966, she was served with additional banning orders, including one prohibiting her from writing for publication. (She had managed, in time, to send abroad an account of her life: this was published by Hutchinson, London, under the title Tomorrow's Sun: a smuggled Journal from South Africa). Because of the new restrictions, she lost the job she held for fifteen years with the Medical Aid Society of the Transvaal Clothing Industry, and is now working in a bookstore. It was hoped that the house arrest would end after five years, but in October 1967, the Government extended the house arrest and banning orders for another five years. Protests The prosecution of Mrs. Joseph has evoked wide protests as a vengeful action. Illustrative is a letter by Mr. Leo Marquard, the well-known South African historian, to the Cape Times (22 September 1967): "Those...who are critical of the manner in which our country is 'misrepresented' and 'maligned' abroad would do well to consider the facts about Mrs. Helen Joseph. "In 1956 she and 155 others were arrested on charges of treason to which charges under the Suppression of Communism Act were subsequently added. After a long and searching trial by a special court of three Supreme Court judges, all were found not guilty. This was in March 1961; but in August 1957, 3 1/2 years earlier, the Minister of Justice condemned her without charge or trial by serving a banning order on her confining her to the Johannesburg magisterial district. "Shortly before the expiration of this order, in October 1962, she became the first South African to suffer house arrest; and in February 1966 this order was extended to prohibit her from ;ublishing or preparing anything for publication. "This order of house arrest has now been extended by the Minister of Justice for another five years. Once more, without trial and with no legal redress, Helen Joseph has been condemned to a further five years of loneliness, cut off from practically all friendly human association. "What are the crimes that this 62-year-old woman is presumed to have committed--crimes that make the powerful Republic of South Africa regard her as a danger to its very existence? In 1966 the then Minister of Justice, Mr. Vorster, gave a few of the reasons for her house arrest. Between 1955 and 1962 she 'attended meetings...to further the achievements of some of the objects of communism'.

-4- "Now during most of that very time she was being tried and acquitted on these very charges by three judges of the Supreme Court... "She had also, said Mr. Vorster, been a member of the Congress of Democrats. True--but at that time the Congress was as legal a body as the Nationalist Party. Thirdly, according to Mr. Vorster, she committed certain other offences between 1955 and 1956. On closer examination these turn out to be the very ones on which she was acquitted. For good measure, Mr. Vorster added the usual rider that there were other reasons but that these could not be disclosed 'without detriment to public policy'. "For the past 12 years at least Helen Joseph has been under close police surveillance, and the only time the Minister of Justice has brought her to open trial she was acquitted. Is the conclusion not inescapable that three successive Ministers of Justice have by-passed the judiciary and taken the law into their own hands? "That is what these Ministers will be remembered for in history, while Helen Joseph will be recalled with gratitude and pleasure by the girls in the armed forces among whom she worked during the war, by those whom she helped to establish the National War Memorial Health Foundation, by the 25,000 Transvaal clothing workers (overwhelmingly Afrikaans-speaking girls) for whom she was a welfare officer, and by her colleagues and friends in these activities." Way of the bully The Johannesburg Star commented on 4 November 1967: "Punishment without end is now joining punishment without trial as a feature of life in Nationalist South Africa. Having just emerged from fiveye r% of house arrest and banning, Mrs. Helen Joseph has had both orders renewed for another half decade. This means that unless she transgressed some law during the past five years--apart from once having failed to report to the police, for which she was in jail for a day--she is now being punished again either for what she is alleged to have done before then or for what she thinks. "The grounds on which Mrs. Joseph is being punished afresh have not been tested or proved in a court of law. This is not justice as civilized people understand the term; it is a negation of the rule of law and has more in common with revenge and prosecution. It is the way of the bully. "The Prime Minister and his advisers must not be surprised if the outside world concludes from this incident that a regime which has to go to such punitive lengths to protect itself against an elderly voman can have precious little self-confidence and not much shame."

-5- Will stay on in South Africa To people who ask why she stays on in South Africa despite the restrictions, Mrs. Joseph replied in 1966: "...by staying here I can show the Nationalist Government that I refuse to be intimidated by their treatment of me, that I can and will endure the conditions they force on me. "And I can show the non-white people here that I intend to remain by their side, come what may. I can still be of use, still bring comfort and friendship to the banished people... "And when the time comes - and I know it will come - when this country is free, I want to be here, to be part of it, to know I have my place in it. "I don't know how that change will come. There was a time when I believed that it could come peacefully, without violence, through the mass organization of the African people, through economic pressure abroad and at home, through the pressure of an organized labour force. "Today all channels of negotiation between white and non-white are closed. The leaders of the African people are imprisoned, outlawed, and silenced; the government is even more determined to suppress all opposition to its apartheid policies. I can no longer be confident of there being a peaceful solution. I only know that the patience of the non-white people is being strained beyond endurance... "Dark and forbidding as the outlook for freedom is now, there is one lesson that the Nationalists have not learnt, and that is that history has shown that tyranny cannot prevail for ever. The writing is on the wall for those who care to read. It is written on the continent of Africa, in the halls of the United Nations, and in th hearts of the non-white people of South Africa, where it is not so easy to see. "But it is there. Quietly, softly, the people are still singing the freedom songs, and they will go on singing. They sing in the streets and in their homes and even in thi jails. As long as there is song, there is hope." (Helen Joseph, Tomorrow s Sun, 1966).

-6- APPENDIX TEXT OF BANJING ORDERS SERVED ON MRS. HELEN JOSEPH IN OCTOBER 1962 (Note: As noted earlier, additional restrictions were imposed on Mrs. Joseph in February 1966). TO: HELEN BEATRIC MAY JOSEPH 35 FANNY AVENUE NORWOOD JOHANNESBURG NOTICE IN TERMS OF PARAGRAPH (a) OF SUB-SECTION (1) OF SECTION TEN OF THE SUPPRESSION OF COMMUNISM ACT, 1950 ACT No. 44 of 1950 1NHEREAS I, BALTHAZAR JOHANNES VORSTER, Minister of Justice of the Republic of South Africa, am satisfied that you are engaged in activities which are furthering or may further the achievement of the objects of communism, I hereby, in terms of Paragraph (a) of sub-section (1) of section ten of the Suppression of Communism Act, 1950 (Act. No. 44 of 1950) prohibit you for a period commencing on the date on which this notice is delivered or tendered to you, and expiring on the 31 day of October, 1967, from-(a) absenting yourself from the residential premises situate at 35 Fanny Avenue, Norwood, Johannesburg-(1) at any time on public holidays; (2) from two-thirty in the afternoon on Saturdays; (3) during the hours of six-thirty in the afternoon and six-thirty in the forenoon on days other than those referred to in (1) and (2) above; (b) absenting yourself from the magisterial district of Johannesburg. (c) being within-(1) any location, native hostel or native village as defined in the Natives (Urban areas) Consolidation Act, 1945, (Act. No. 25 of 1945); (2) the area of jurisdiction of the Alexandra Local Area Committee as defined in Administrator's Proclamation No. 27 of the 3rd February, 1958; (3) any native compound; (4) the premises of any factory as defined in the Factories, Machinery and Building Work Act, 1941 (Act. No. 22 of 1941);

-7- (d) commuricating in any manner whatsoever with any person whose name appears on any list in the custody of the officer referred to in section eight of the said Suppression of Communism Act, 1950 or in respect of whom any prohibition under the Suppression of Communism Act, 1950 is in force: (e) receiving at the said residential premises any visitor other than a medical practitioner for medical attendance on you, if the name of such medical practitioner does not appear on any list in the custody of the officer referred to in section eight of the said Suppression of Comnunism Act, 1950, is in force in respect of such medical practitioner. Given under my hand at Pretoria on this llth day of October, 1962 TO: HELEN BEATRICE MAY JOSEPH 35 FANNY AVENUE, NORNOOD, JOHANNESBURG. NOTICE IN TERMS OF SUBSECTION (1) OF SECTION NINE OF THE SUPPRESSION OF COMMUNISM ACT, 1950 ACT No. 44 of 1950. WHEREAS I, BALTHAZAR JOHANNES VORSTER, Minister of Justice of the Republic of South Africa, am satisfied that you are engaged in activities which are furthering or are calculated to further the achievement of any of the objects of Communism, I hereby, in terms of sub-section (1) of Section Nine of the Suppression of Communism Act, 1950 (Act No. 44 of 1950) prohibit you for a period commencing on the date on which this notice is delivered or tendered to you and expiring on th the 31st day of October 1967, from attending within the Republic of South Africa- (1) any gathering contemplated in paragraph (a) of the said sub-section; or (2) any gathering contemplated in paragraph (b) of the said subsection not being such a gathering as is contemplated in the said paragraph (a), of the nature, class or kind set out below. (i) any social gathering, that is to say, any gathering, at which the persons present also have social intercourse with one another; (ii) any politlcal gathering, that is to say, any gathering at which any form of state or any principle or policy of the Governent of a State is propagated, defended, criticised or discussed. Given under my hand at Pretoria on this llth day of .October, 1962. (signed) MINISTER OF JUSTICE (Note: These orders, signed on October 11, 1962, were served on Mrs. Joseph on October 13, 1962).