The Cape Town railway station is illuminated with six 2000 candle-power “Brush” arc lamps. The Cape Argus newspaper reports: "The Railway Station was thronged with citizens of both sexes, curious to witness the illumination of the building for the first time with the electric light.”
The first of the Closer Union Conventions begins in Durban, Natal Colony, South Africa, with an aim of joining Britain’s two South African colonies with the two Boer Republics, the Republic of South Africa (Transvaal) and the Orange Free State. The goal is to create a single country, to be called the Union of South Africa. African peoples, who make up more than 90% of the country’s population, are not invited to the unionisation discussions.
Martial Law is declared in South Africa to counter a military uprising by Afrikaners who seek to re-fight the Anglo-Boer Wars they have lost twice. Generals Luis Botha and Jan Smuts will suppress the rebellion.
A new regional airlines for Southern Africa is formed: the Rhodesian and Nyasaland Airways, with flights linking Salisbury (Harare), Bulawayo, Livingstone, Broken Hill, Lusaka, Ndola and Blantyre.
As it is every year, today’s National Day of Spain is observed at Spain’s only African colony, Equatorial Guinea. Spain’s colours decorate the city of Malabo (pic). Like Portugal, Spain is slow to end its colonial presence in Africa.
Africa’s first full-size planetarium opens in South Africa. The Johannesburg Planetarium, located on the campus of the University of the Witwatersrand, features a Zeiss MkIII projector that has been in use in Hamburg, Germany but is completely rebuilt and modernized. The device will be replaced by a digitalized system in 2023.
South Africa’s activists fighting the oppression of black people under apartheid laws find fault with the comparison used in the U.S. that segregated southern American states like Mississippi where police are brutilising civil rights workers is like South Africa. The Pretoria News publishes a cartoon today with the caption: "Yes, there is a difference. In Mississippi, thugs are breaking the laws. In South Africa, they are making them." The editor is condemned by the Speaker of South Africa’s House of Assembly.
The 1968 Summer Olympics begins in Mexico City with a record 21 African countries participating. Libya competes for the first time, as do Tanganyika and Zanzibar united as Tanzania. South Africa is banned due to its racist apartheid government. These Olympic Games will establish Kenya’s “Distance Dynasty.”
Equatorial Guinea achieves national independence, from Spain. A Spanish psychological profile of Equatorial Guinea’s new president, Francisco Macías Nguema, shows he is likely insane. The study’s findings are not made public. Nguema will command dictatorial powers as he proceeds to murder one-sixth of the population. He will be overthrown and executed in 1979.
South African-born Allan MaLeod Cormack is awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for his work in developing computer-assisted tomography, which will lead to the development of CAT scan technology.
On his second trip to Southern Africa, King of Pop Michael Jackson, after visiting Swaziland (Eswatini), today has his second visit with President Nelson Mandela.
As a penalty for mounting a coup d’état in 1997, 25 Sierra Leone soldiers and officers are executed by firing squad after their court martial convictions.
South Africa’s rap-rave group Die Antwoord releases its debut album $O$. The alternative hip-hop/rave/electronica album is made available free on the Internet.
Nigerian billionaires Aliko Dangote (pic: left) and Abdul Samad Rabiu (pic: right), the richest and second richest men in the country, together earn a capital markets record of N30.4 billion (US$78.4 million) in eight hours.
Liberian poet, novelist and essayist, in Monrovia, Liberia. His passion for folklore informs his writings in popular stories like The Money Doubler (1976).
Nigerian linguist and writer, in Amakopara/Ihitenansa, Imo State, British Nigeria. The foremost expert in the Igho language, he also did groundbreaking research in non-Nigerian African languages, and advanced the study and criticism of African literature.
South African professional golfer, in Cape Town, South Africa. The first woman golfer to be inducted into the South Africa Hall of Fame, she won 15 Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) events and two major LPGA championships from 1971, when she was named Rookie of the Year.
Nigerian physicist and educator, in Onitsha, Anambra State, British Nigeria. The first woman to head the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Nigeria, she was later the first woman at that university to be Dean of the Faculty of Physical Sciences. She applies her expertise in the Earth’s ionosphere to the study of solar radiation's affect on climate change.
