Retro Raunch Revisit

This month marks the 45th anniversary of the publication debut of VELVET magazine (1977). The last print issue was Jun 2016.


SEPTEMBER 1977 ON THE WORLD STAGE Steven Biko, the leader of the black consciousness movement in South Africa, has died in police custody. The 30yr old's death was confirmed by the Commissioner of Police, General Gert Prinsloo, and it is understood Biko died in hospital in Pretoria. The government Minister of Justice & Police, James Kruger, stated that Biko had been transferred 740 miles (1,191 km) from Port Elizabeth to Pretoria for medical attention following a 7-day strike. He was in custody since Aug 18th when he was arrested & detained under the Terrorism Act. He is the 20th person to die in custody during the past 18 months. Steven Biko was born in King William's Town in the Eastern Cape of South Africa in Dec 1946. He became active in the anti-apartheid movement in the 1960's when he was studying medicine at the University of Natal. After initially joining the National Union of South African Students' (NUSAS), he resigned in 1969 because he felt it did not represent the needs of black students. That July, he set up the South African Students' Organisation (SASO) and was elected its first president the following year. In 1972 due to his increasing political involvement, Biko was expelled from medical school and began working full-time for the Black Community Programmes (BCP). He also started writing regularly for the SASO newsletter under the pen-name of Frank Talk and by 1973, his work had come to the attention of the White-minority government who, in an attempt to curtail his endeavors, imposed a banning order on him restricting him to his home town. Biko however continued his work with the BCP which succeeded in building a healthcare clinic and a crèche (nursery) in King William's Town. In 1975, he was instrumental in setting up several community groups including both the Zimele Trust Fund which helped political prisoners & their families, and the Ginsberg Educational Trust to assist black students. In January of this year he was made honorary president of the BCP. An inquest into his death is not to be held for several months according to the authorities but world media has condemned the South African secrecy as ongoing extreme abusiveness, noting the continuing long disturbing history of black suffering & fatal brutal beatings in jail at the hands of police interrogation, and especially by members of the security branch who with their sweeping powers to seize individuals for the slightest of perceived offenses, have for decades been accused of torture. Steven Biko leaves behind a wife and two children.