From Soweto to Southern Africa: Fifty Years After June 16, Education Remains an Act of Liberation

On 16 June 1976, thousands of students in Soweto took to the streets to reject the apartheid government’s decision to impose Afrikaans as a medium of instruction. Their protest was about language, but it was also about dignity, opportunity and the right to learn.

The state’s response was brutal. Police opened fire on children. Schools became battlegrounds. Communities were placed under siege. Detentions, torture and harassment followed. As resistance spread across South Africa, education itself became a casualty of apartheid’s determination to maintain racial domination.

Many young people faced an impossible choice: remain and endure repression or leave home in search of safety and education. Thousands chose exile. Their journeys would shape not only South Africa’s future but the future of an entire region.

Today, as South Africa marks the 50th anniversary of the Soweto Uprising, the story of June 16 extends far beyond a single day. It is a story of regional solidarity, educational resistance and the belief that learning can be a powerful weapon against injustice.

It is also the story that gave birth to the Canon Collins Educational Trust for Southern Africa. Established in 1981 by the Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa, the Trust was created to support young refugees fleeing apartheid South Africa and, later, Namibia, then under illegal South African occupation.

At a time when Black education in South Africa had been systematically degraded through Bantu Education and countless young people found themselves displaced from classrooms and countries, the Trust provided scholarships, funded literacy programmes in refugee camps, supported teachers and supplied educational materials to children whose futures had been disrupted by conflict and oppression.

Education became a lifeline. What apartheid sought to deny, solidarity sought to restore. The impact of that solidarity can still be seen today. Across Southern Africa, former scholarship recipients now occupy leadership positions in government, academia, civil society and the legal profession. Their achievements stand as a living reminder that educational opportunity creates ripple effects far beyond the individual.

For Helga Jansen-Daugbjerg, the connection between education and democracy remains inseparable.

“My post-grad scholarship support helped me cement my ideas of how I want to contribute to change,” she says.

As a mature student, she sees a responsibility that extends beyond personal success.

“My responsibility is about paying it forward. I am aware of how my own success can inspire and be a lesson for younger students. I make it my objective in every space I am in to support younger people, especially young Black women.”

Jansen-Daugbjerg was only six years old in 1976, but the uprising shaped the generation that followed.

“I have traumatic memories, and as I came through high school in the 1980s, the story of 1976 was always with us. My understanding of the impact of 1976 is that education remains the cornerstone of democracy. Without education, a society will crumble and fail.”

Her words echo one of the most enduring lessons of the uprising: that education is not merely about acquiring knowledge but education creates citizens capable of shaping democratic societies.

That lesson left a deep impression on another generation of activists.

Canon Collins Alum and Public Prosecutor, Derrick Grootboom, was not in Soweto in 1976, but he belongs to the generation that inherited its spirit.

Growing up in the Southern Cape, he became involved in community mobilisation through the United Democratic Front during the turbulent 1980s. He was eventually arrested in 1985 and imprisoned for seven years.

For Grootboom, June 16 is not a date confined to history books.

“It gives young people the opportunity to change their destiny,” he says.

He recalls how university and college students, forced off campuses by boycotts and unrest, returned to their communities and became teachers in a broader sense.

“They taught us about apartheid and capitalism and what was wrong with our society. That was a spark that lit the fire.”

Those informal lessons helped sustain resistance throughout the 1980s and contributed to the eventual collapse of apartheid.

His conclusion carries particular weight on this anniversary.

 

“Give young people a chance, teach them the right ways, and they will take the baton and run with it and complete the race.”

The challenges facing young people today may look different, but many of the barriers remain familiar.

For Canon Collins alumnus Amukelane Nkwinika, the struggle for educational access did not end with democracy.

A beneficiary of both NSFAS and Canon Collins support, he knows first-hand how financial barriers continue to exclude talented young people.

“Without them, my parents would not have had the funds to take me to university. Scholarships gave me the financial relief to carry out my studies without being a subject of financial exclusion.”

He argues that the central lesson of June 16 is often misunderstood.

“The government has missed the point that the struggle was not only about language but access as well. Language acted as a barrier to discourage the education of young Black people, and today class struggle serves the same purpose.”

The obstacle has changed shape. Poverty, unemployment and inequality continue to limit educational opportunities for many young people across Southern Africa.

The fight for access remains unfinished. Yet the story of June 16 has never belonged solely to South Africa. Across the region, neighbouring countries bore the costs of liberation struggles. They hosted refugees, accommodated exiles and supported movements fighting against apartheid and colonial rule.

Namibia’s own liberation struggle was deeply intertwined with events unfolding south of its border.

For Namibian scholar Gerson Shikukumwa, June 16 represents a continental moment of youth resistance.

“As a student of politics, I feel that June 16 is an important date in Namibia’s history. It is an important symbol of young people’s resistance and rebellion against colonial rule on the continent.”

He sees the Soweto Uprising as a turning point that demonstrated the transformative power of youth activism.

“The Soweto Uprising demonstrated the radical power of young people, and that is why it is considered a defining moment in the struggle against apartheid, not only in South Africa but also in Namibia.”

Fifty years later, that power remains one of June 16’s most important legacies.