Seventy years of standing up and standing tall: Black Sash turns 70

Seventy years ago, a handful of principled women stood on a street corner, draped in black sashes, their silence cutting through the noise of apartheid’s rising tide.

They were not politicians. They held no official power. Yet in that moment, they birthed a movement that would become one of South Africa’s most enduring voices of conscience. It was 1955. Parliament was moving to tear Coloured voters from the roll. The Constitution was under siege. And in a society that expected women to host tea parties and keep quiet, these women chose to stand instead—silent, unwavering, unafraid.

What began as a quiet protest on the streets of Cape Town would ignite a movement. That black sash—meant to mourn the death of justice—became a symbol of defiance, dignity, and fierce moral clarity. With each vigil, each march, each brave act of bearing witness, they stitched a new kind of resistance into the fabric of South African history.

Black Sash was born—not in shouts or slogans, but in silence. And that silence roared. Nelson Mandela once called Black Sash “the conscience of white South Africa”—the moral compass, the truth-teller, the ethical anchor in an era of silence. And now, in 2025, that iconic sash turns 70. Thanks to a small group of white women appalled by the erosion of constitutional democracy in South Africa - particularly the National Party’s attempt to strip Coloured voters of their right to vote in the Cape Province.

These women—wives, mothers, professionals—stood in silent protest, daring to dissent in a world where women were expected to keep quiet. They were dismissed at the time— "tea ladies with too much time" as one politician once said. But history had other plans.

From vigils outside Parliament to standing against bannings, detentions, pass laws, forced removals, and the horrors of apartheid’s legal machinery, Black Sash found its voice—and made sure the voiceless were heard too. One of their most revolutionary acts wasn’t loud. It was practical. The founding of Advice Offices—quiet, tireless spaces that helped Black South Africans navigate the oppressive nightmare of apartheid bureaucracy.

They helped people get their ID books, pensions, housing rights, and freedom of movement. It was resistance dressed in paperwork. Bureaucratic sabotage with compassion. That work continues today, still vital, still grounded in human dignity.

These women shared conspiratorial winks during protests, hid illegal pamphlets under diaper bags, and smuggled information in Christmas pudding tins. They were fierce and funny. If you were lucky enough to attend a Black Sash conference, you’d know to expect sharp political debate and homemade lemon squares. How could we forget women like Molly Blackburn, who fearlessly investigated police brutality and died tragically young in a car accident. Or Sheena Duncan, whose quiet authority and deep Christian conviction made her a moral compass in dark times.

Or Mary Burton, who carried her activism from Black Sash to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. These weren’t just activists. They were architects of conscience. Seventy years on, South Africa may no longer be in the grip of formal apartheid, but for millions, injustice has simply changed its uniform. It no longer wears jackboots—it hides behind malfunctioning grant systems, broken service delivery, and indifferent bureaucracy.

And once again, the Black Sash is there—watching, warning, working. Today, Black Sash is on the frontlines of economic justice, fighting for the soul of the Constitution where it matters most: at community level. There’s #HandsOffOurGrants, one of the most significant post-apartheid human rights campaigns in recent memory. When grant recipients—primarily women—were being illegally debited, exploited by financial service providers, and denied full access to their social protection, it was the Black Sash who stepped in. Who held government and private corporations accountable. Who reminded us that the right to social security is not charity—it is justice.

Through its Community-Based Monitoring programme, Black Sash trains and supports local human rights monitors who collect evidence and raise alarms on failing clinics, inaccessible Home Affairs offices, overcrowded SASSA centres, and the daily indignities that poor and working-class South Africans endure.

These aren’t abstract reports—they’re living, breathing testimonies from the ground. In the face of growing inequality and joblessness, the organisation’s Basic Income Support(BIS) campaign is a moral call to action. The Sash is unapologetically demanding a permanent, universal basic income grant for those aged 18 to 59—because dignity should not depend on employment in an economy that has none to offer.

Whether it’s standing outside broken clinics, challenging state indifference, or calling for systemic change, Black Sash today is not a relic of the past. It is a necessary force in the present. Because the struggle has not ended—it has evolved. And Black Sash, with its legacy of vigilance and compassion, continues to evolve with it.

Still watching. Still protecting. Still believing that South Africa can and must do better. In an age of corruption, digital exclusion, and broken service delivery, Black Sash stands with the marginalised - reminding us that dignity matters. That the Constitution is not a museum piece, but a living document. That civil society is not a luxury, but a necessity. 

They also remind us of the long view—that justice is not always quick, but it is always worth fighting for. Seventy years on, that conscience has not faded. Today, it beats stronger than ever—now the voice of the marginalised, the protector of dignity, the watchdog for justice in a democracy still finding its way.

| Meth is National Communications and Media Manager at Black Sash

THE MERCURY