The General Law Amendment Act, number 37 of 1963 (commenced 2 May), commonly known as the 90-Day Detention Law,
allowed a South African police officer to detain without warrant a person suspected of a politically motivated crime for up to 90 days without access to a lawyer. When used in practice, suspects were re-detained for another 90-day period immediately after release.
The Amendment Act also introduced the "Sobukwe Clause" which allowed people already convicted of political offenses to be further detained (initially for twelve months). Named the Sobukwe Clause because it was used to keep PAC leader
Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe
Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe (5 December 1924 – 27 February 1978) was a prominent South African anti-apartheid revolutionary and founding member of the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), serving as the first president of the organization.
Sobukwe w ...
(who was originally arrested in 1960 and sentenced to three years) in
Robben Island
Robben Island ( af, Robbeneiland) is an island in Table Bay, 6.9 kilometres (4.3 mi) west of the coast of Bloubergstrand, north of Cape Town, South Africa. It takes its name from the Dutch word for seals (''robben''), hence the Dutch/Afrik ...
for an additional six years.
This Act strengthened previous amendments by further defining political crimes under Apartheid. Section 5 of the Act made a capital crime out of "receiving training that could further the objects of communism or advocating abroad economic or social change in South Africa by violent means through the aid of a foreign government or institution where the accused is a resident or former resident of South Africa".
The legislation made provisions for imposing "sentences ranging from a minimum of five years imprisonment to death for anyone leaving the country to learn sabotage techniques, for advocating the forcible overthrow of the government or for urging the forcible intervention in domestic South African affairs by an outside power, including the
UN".
Further expansion of Act
The act was amended by the General Law Amendment Act No 80 of 1964 which allowed the Minister of Justice of Apartheid South Africa to extend the "Sobukwe Clause" as desired.
Repeal
The act was repealed by the
Internal Security Act, 1982
The Internal Security Act, 1982 (Act No. 74 of 1982) was an act of the Parliament of South Africa that consolidated and replaced various earlier pieces of security legislation, including the Suppression of Communism Act, 1950, parts of the Riot ...
, which, however, gave the government similar powers of detention.
See also
*
:Apartheid laws in South Africa
*
Apartheid in South Africa
Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...
References
External links
African History: Apartheid Legislation in South Africa
Apartheid laws in South Africa
1963 in South African law
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