junior secondaries) along the way. Action Committee members would stay to the right of the marchers, so they could communicate with one another. Each school had a set hour of departure, designed to allow the participants to converge on the Orlando West area from various parts of Soweto at about the same time. There they would link up with students from Orlando West High School and its junior secondary, and continue on to a stadium for a mass rally. Satisfied with the scheme, Tsietsi left his co-conspirators with one last caveat: no violence.
That night Joseph and Nomkhitha prepared for bed as usual. If the house seemed quiet, it was because Tsietsi had yet to return home. Nomkhitha thought about his absence and realized she had not seen much of him lately; he was probably at the high school, ‘cross-nighting’ with his friends. She would speak to him about it tomorrow after work.
June 16 dawned a bitterly cold winter’s day. Tsietsi was already at Morris Issacson when Murphy Morobe, another member of the Action Committee, arrived at the school. He and Tsietsi huddled in a corner of the schoolyard to review last-minute details. Assembly wouldn’t start for another thirty minutes, but the undercurrent of excitement among the students was palpable. ‘The main thing’, Tsietsi whispered to Murphy, ‘is not to provoke the police. We have to keep telling everyone to be disciplined, that we’re marching to a particular place and then we’ll disperse.’
At eight o’clock, as was the custom at Morris Issacson, the deputy principal called the students to order in the yard and led them in morning prayers. Usually he would have enumerated the day’s activities, then dismissed the students for class. Instead, as if on cue, the youths held up posters and unfurled banners denouncing the use of Afrikaans. Tsietsi jumped up, exclaiming, ‘We are marching!’ Someone threw open the gates to the school and Tsietsi led hundreds of youths, most of the student body, out of the yard, shouting ‘Amandla!’ (Power!) and thrusting his fist in the air in the black power salute. ‘Ngawethu!’ (It is ours!) screamed the excited youngsters in response, a singing, chanting river of humanity that flowed towards Thesele Junior Secondary, about a half a mile down the road.
Mpho, meanwhile, had arrived early at Thesele to stow his banner under his desk where he usually kept his things. He had not brought his textbooks; Tsietsi and his friends said they would close Thesele before classes started. Mpho’s fellow students encircled him. They wanted to know what he had under his arm, and where were his books? Mpho, grinning with self-importance, said nothing. He hurried into his classroom, hid the banner and ran back to the schoolyard.
The gates closed at eight o’clock and the students arranged themselves in the yard according to classes. A teacher intoned a prayer. Then the principal, a no-nonsense sort of man, delivered the usual admonishments about arriving late to school and not completing homework. Mpho barely noticed his words; distraught, he was straining to hear any unusual noise or disturbance. The principal seemed about to conclude his remarks and dispatch the students to their classes. Mpho would be caught with no books – a very serious offence, punishable by being sent to the principal’s office.
Suddenly, Mpho heard what sounded like faint singing in the distance. The noise became progressively louder. By now, the principal had heard it, too. He went to the gates to investigate, warning the assembled youngsters not to break ranks. Before he could reach them, the gates were thrown open and a wave of students, identifiably from Morris Issacson in their blue-and-gold jackets, surged into the schoolyard.
The orderly assembly dissolved into chaos. The Morris Issacson youths were everywhere, brandishing their placards, yelling at the Thesele students to put down their books, urging them to march to Orlando West. Mpho watched as Tsietsi and his friends followed the principal into his office; the school’s siren sounded soon after in an attempt to restore calm. Mpho suddenly found himself organizing a group of his friends to march. After all, had he not helped to make the banners and placards the Morris Issacson students were carrying? And was he not the brother of the student who, at this very moment, was telling the principal – the principal! – that they were shutting down the school? Mpho dashed inside to his classroom and grabbed his banner; racing back to the schoolyard, he unfurled it to the admiring gasps of his friends. Cougar, who also attended Thesele, stood by his side.
Tsietsi emerged from the school and addressed the crowd from a ledge where the principal had stood during assembly. ‘Students of Soweto,’ Tsietsi shouted, ‘we’re tired of what is happening. We must take action against the white regime. We’re joining the other schools that are on strike. We’re closing down schools to show these Boers that we will not accept Afrikaans. We’re going to say: away with Afrikaans, away with Bantu education. But we need discipline. We will probably meet the police. But there’s to be no stone throwing, no provocation. Please remain disciplined.’
The youngsters roared their approval; they had never heard anything like this articulated publicly. Tsietsi led the mass of pupils out of the schoolyard towards the old Roodepoort road, a large thoroughfare that bisected much of Soweto. As they marched, the youngsters sang a haunting, dirge-like protest song from the 1950s: Senzeni na? Senzeni na? What have we done? Oh, what have we done? (What is our crime?) To Murphy Morobe, helping to shepherd the students along, the scene evoked the feeling of exhilaration he had experienced as a child at Christmas.
The marchers had to pass a primary school to arrive at their next destination, Itshepeng Junior Secondary. (Before the march, Tsietsi and the Action Committee members had agreed to exclude the younger children.) Ten-year-old Tshepiso was in the schoolyard, helping to pick up litter, when he heard a deafening noise. A huge group of students from Mpho’s and Tsietsi’s schools suddenly appeared on the road, singing and waving banners. Tshepiso watched them pass, open-mouthed; he had never seen so many people in his life. A teacher who was supervising them told the youngsters sharply to go inside to class. Tshepiso could not stop thinking about the mass of students all morning, wondering if his brothers were among them.
As the demonstration reached Itshepeng, pupils ran to the windows and rushed out of the doors, drawn by the singing. Dee was amazed at the sudden appearance of hundreds of students, jumping about and carrying signs. He was even more astonished to see Tsietsi at the head of all these youths; Dee had not been privy to the activity in his house during the previous days. He watched as Tsietsi directed the younger pupils to go home and urged the older ones to join the march. Then he saw Mpho, who was carrying a banner. Mpho explained everything to Dee. When Tsietsi ordered the students, after about half an hour, to leave the school grounds, Dee, Mpho and Cougar marched out together.
The numbers of youngsters swelled as the march progressed towards Orlando West. Each time they passed another school, Tsietsi and his lieutenants added those students to the demonstration. Dee began noticing more policemen on the streets. They were only lightly armed and seemed unsure of what to do. Emboldened, the students began to chant in Zulu in a kind of staccato rhythm: Siyabasaba na? Siyabasaba na? (Are we afraid of them? Are we are afraid of them?) Dee felt an incredible excitement. For the first time in his life, blacks were protesting on the streets of Soweto. Propelled by the rhythm of their songs, united in their purpose, each seemed a link in an unbreakable chain.
Tsietsi led the marchers through the Dube section of Soweto. The Action Committee members walked along the right-hand side of the road, keeping the students to the left. Although the organizers had mapped out the general direction of the trek from Morris Issacson, Tsietsi determined the exact route as it advanced. He rode up and down the line of demonstrators in a car driven by a journalist. Indicating to his lieutenants the course they must take, he tried to keep to side streets to avoid traffic and the greatest concentration of police. The latter had been taken by surprise and made only feeble attempts to stop the march.
As the demonstrators neared a vocational training centre, they encountered car driven by a white woman. Not knowing of the march, she had tried, as usual, to go to her government job in the township. The terrified woman suddenly found herself engulfed by chanting, singing, jostling youngsters. Tsietsi exhorted them to make way for her. The
