Apartheid Protest Ends at Berkeley as Last 35 Depart

BERKELEY — Anti-apartheid protesters on the University of California, Berkeley, campus dispersed peacefully on orders of campus police Wednesday, ending what officials said was the longest continuous demonstration in the school’s history.

Only about 35 people remained on the steps of Sproul Hall when 45 members of the university Police Department ordered them to move at 2 p.m.

The demonstrators did as they were told, making way for janitors to begin picking up the signs, sleeping bags, blankets, tables, posters, cooking utensils and other items left behind.

The demonstrators are seeking to force divestment of the University of California’s estimated $2.2 billion in holdings in companies that do business in South Africa.

“This certainly isn’t the end of the movement,” said Ross Hammond, 22, a political science senior who was one the leaders of the protest. “We’re not going to leave the regents alone until they drop all investment in South Africa.”

But he moved away with the others nonetheless.

University spokesman Ray Colvig said only a few students actually remained among the protesters at the end. “The semester ended last Friday,” he explained, “and summer school doesn’t start until late in June.”

Colvig said the demonstration, which began in Sproul Plaza on April 10, was the longest continuous event of its kind in the history of the Berkeley campus, birthplace of the Free Speech Movement and center of numerous protests in the 1960s.

Meanwhile, the Alameda County district attorney dropped charges against nearly 600 people who were arrested on suspicion of trespassing during the protest.

But Assistant Dist. Atty. Jeff Horner said prosecution will continue for 32 people charged with resisting arrest during a campus confrontation April 16 because of the “considerable amount of force and violence” they used.