SOUTH AFRICAN FREEDOM FIGHTER TO DETAIL "ONE MAN'S STORY OF APARTHEID" POUGHKEEPSIE

Eddie Daniels, who helped form the African Resistance Movement to exert pressure on the apartheid government of South Africa, spoke at a public forum on September 20 at Marist College. Eddie begun his visit to campus with a conversation with President Dennis J. Murray on the state of South Africa, the conversation was followed by a luncheon with students, faculty, and staff and a public lecture.

Daniels was born in South Africa in 1928. He was classified as "Coloured" according to South Africa's apartheid laws. Because of his opposition to apartheid as a member of the Liberal Party of South Africa and the African Resistance Movement, he was banned, detained, imprisoned, and banned again. Facing a possible death penalty, he refused to be witness for the state or give undertakings to two supreme court judges who were prepared to negotiate with the National government for his release from prison. Daniels served his sentence of fifteen years on Robben Island in "B" section in the company of Nelson Mandela and other anti-apartheid leaders. Three years and eight months after his release from prison, after the lifting of his banning orders, he and his wife Eleanor married in defiance of the Immorality and Mixed Marriages Acts. Eddie Daniels lives in Somerset West, near Cape Town.

This will be Daniels' third visit to Marist. He will sign copies of his autobiography "There and Back" at the end of his presentation. For further information, call the Marist International programs office at (845) 575-3330.