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Blood Fruit (2014)

 

The story of 11 young Irish Dunnes Stores workers who went on strike following their refusal to handle South African produce.

OVERVIEW

This moving documentary explains how a strike over the sale of South African fruit in Ireland became the focus of world attention as a key battleground in the fight against apartheid. The film takes audiences back to 1984, the height of apartheid in South Africa. Mary Manning, a 21-year-old Dunnes Stores checkout girl, refused to sell two Outspan grapefruits under direction from her union in support of the anti-apartheid struggle. She and ten other supporters were suspended, and a strike ensued. The eleven knew little about apartheid and assumed they’d be back to work before long, but the arrival on the picket line of activist Nimrod Sejake changed everything, setting the strikers on a path never expected. His influence on the strikers and their struggle to bring about change proved to be the central turning point in their motivation for not only continuing the strike but advancing it to the international stage.

Director: Sinéad O'Brien

Producer: Noel Pearson


CONTRIBUTORS

Mary Manning, Karen Gearon, Cathryn O'Reilly, Liz Deasy, Michelle Gavin, Vonnie Munroe, Alma Russell, Sandra Griffin, Theresa Mooney, Brendan Barron, Tommy Davis, Uché Gabriel Akujobi, Archbishop Desmon Tutu.