David v Goliath struggle

STARTED in Joburg in 1981, the Detainees’ Parents Support Committee (DPSC) was set up by parents, partners and the families of activists who were detained without trial and thus had no recourse to legal intervention.

There were many in this movement, as described in this fascinating, often harrowing but ever-important book, who had not even been politically involved. Members of the DPSC stood on street corners with placards calling for the release of their children.

They organised food, clothing and legal representation for detainees across the country. DPSC activists marched, petitioned, argued, wrote and protested for the release of all being held. They made public the brutal operations of the security establishment and helped to draw international attention to the atrocities being perpetuated against children – some as young as nine – by the apartheid government.

Some of the evidence garnered by the DPSC helped to lay the groundwork for South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

It tells the story of how the anti-detention movement became part of a mass uprising that eventually brought apartheid to its knees.

And it inspires in relating how ordinary people stood up against the terrible scourge of racism and the malicious abuse of power.