About SAHA

The South African History Archive (SAHA) is an independent human rights archive dedicated to documenting and providing access to archival holdings that relate to past and contemporary struggles for justice in South Africa.

Established by anti-apartheid activists in the 1980s, SAHA was closely connected in its formative years to the United Democratic Front, a connection that is reflected in the substantive collections of UDF materials in SAHA’s archives. SAHA archival collections that contain materials relating to the UDF include:

  • AL2421 Natal Indian Congress Records
  • AL2424 Johannesburg Democratic Action Committee (Jodac) Records
  • AL2425 South African Youth Congress (Sayco) Records
  • AL2431 United Democratic Front (UDF) Records
  • AL2446 SAHA Poster Collection
  • AL2457 The Original SAHA Collection
  • AL2460 The Julie Frederikse Collection
  • AL2517 African National Congress Women’s Section papers
  • AL2540 SAHA Ephemera Collection
  • AL2547 SAHA Original Photograph Collection
  • AL2563 Transvaal Indian Congress (TIC) Records
  • AL2566 PLANACT Records
  • AL2934 Dawie Bosch Papers
  • AL2957 Ismail Vadi Papers
  • AL3013 Barbara Hogan Papers
  • AL3109 UDF Working Group On International Relations Records
  • AL3116 Janet Cherry Papers
  • AL3182 National Medical And Dental Association Records
  • AL3183 Lawyers For Human Rights Records

SAHA is now politically non-aligned, committed to collecting materials from organisations and individuals across a broad socio-political spectrum and making archives accessible to as many South Africans as possible.

SAHA’s central mission is to recapture lost and neglected histories and to record aspects of South African history in the making. This informs our continued focus on documenting past struggles against apartheid, as well as ongoing struggles in the making of democracy.

SAHA currently organises its activities into two core programmes:

  • The Freedom of Information Programme (FOIP) is dedicated to using South Africa’s Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2000 in order to extend the boundaries of freedom of information and to build up an archive of materials released under the Act for public use.
  • The Struggles for Justice (SFJ) Programme focuses on collecting, preserving and creating access to archival materials held by SAHA, and promoting related archival collections across the region.

The archives at SAHA can be accessed by researchers and other interested members of the public by appointment at the SAHA office in Johannesburg. For more information about our archival materials, our programmes, please contact:

The South African History Archive
PO Box 31719
Braamfontein
2017

Tel: +27 (0) 11 717 1941
Fax: +27 (0) 11 717 1964
Email:
Web: http://www.saha.org.za