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This resource is hosted by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, but was compiled and authored by Padraig O’Malley. It is the product of almost two decades of research and includes analyses, chronologies, historical documents, and interviews from the apartheid and post-apartheid eras.

1965. Bantu Laws Amendment Act

Barber & Barratt (1990: 120) date this act 1973 (another amendment?), while Thompson (1990: 199) dates it 1964. However, Riley (1991: 90) specifically mentions that this act came into effect on 1 January 1965.

This act "empowered the government to expel any African from any of the towns or the white farming areas at any time" (Thompson 1990: 199). It was "the most rigid of the apartheid legislation so far ... [It] provided the legal framework for stripping Blacks of most of their remaining rights in White areas in return for independence in their own tribal homelands... the minister of Bantu administration was empowered to establish 'proscribed areas' in which he could limit both total number of Black workers and the number of Blacks employed in any particular industry. He could also ban the further use of Black labour in any geographical area and send surplus Black workers to the Bantustans" (Riley 1991: 90).

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