Steve Biko

Who is Steve Biko?

Steve Bantu Biko was a South African anti-apartheid activist and the founding leader of the Black Consciousness Movement, one of the most influential political and social movements of the 1970s. Born in King William's Town in the Eastern Cape in 1946, he studied medicine before turning to full-time activism, founding the South African Students' Organisation in 1968 to promote Black pride, self-reliance, and psychological liberation from the sense of inferiority imposed by apartheid. His writings, later collected in the volume 'I Write What I Like,' argued that true liberation required Black South Africans to first free their own minds before political change could follow. Banned by the apartheid government in 1973, which severely restricted his movement and speech, Biko continued his activism covertly until he was arrested at a police roadblock in August 1977. He died in police custody on 12 September 1977 from injuries sustained during interrogation, and his death became a rallying point against apartheid brutality, drawing international condemnation and inspiring generations of South African activists.

Sources: Steve Biko, I Write What I Like (Bowerdean Press, 1978, ed. Aelred Stubbs) · Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa, Biko inquest findings (1997-1998) · South African History Online, Steve Bantu Biko biography