Apartheid Archives: How A 21-YO Irish Cashier Rocked South Africa’s Racist Regime

This month marks the 35th anniversary of the Dunnes Stores anti-Apartheid strike in Ireland.

Riyaz Patel

The struggle against the racist apartheid regime in South Africa reached the Dunnes Stores Henry Street shop floor in Ireland in 1984.

Mary Manning, then 21, stepped unknowingly into history on that November morning when she refused to register the sale of the two Outspan grapefruits.

Management had issued a final warning to staff over refusing to handle South African goods. Manning defied that warning. She was brought up to the manager’s office and promptly suspended.

She was complying with a directive from her union – IDATU – not to handle any South African goods in protest against the racist apartheid (apartness) system in the country.

Manning left the store, followed out in solidarity by nine of her colleagues – eight women, one man. None of them would return to work for nearly two years.