1984 THE FACTS AND FIGURES | South African Singles Charts

From https://sacharts.wordpress.com/2020/08/11/1984-the-facts-and-figures/

1984 saw the start of the UK miners’ strike and that same year the Provisional IRA tried to assassinate Margaret Thatcher by planting a bomb at the Conservative Party’s conference in Brighton. The aids virus was discovered, and the computer game Tetris first appeared. The summer Olympics were held in Los Angeles where local lass Zola Budd (representing Britain) collided with Mary Decker during the 3000m and neither finished the race (And if you want to be a trivia expert, Romania’s Maricica Puica went on to win the race). PW Botha was inaugurated as first State President of SA and news came through of the famine in Ethiopia which led to the Band Aid single and Live Aid concert later that year. Also, the Vatican finally officially forgave Galileo for saying that the earth revolved around the sun (368 years after the event). On the film front a certain Arnold Schwarzenegger appeared in a movie called ‘The Terminator’. The year also saw the births of Calvin Harris, AB de Villiers, Trevor Noah, Olly Murs, Prince Harry, Katie Melua, Dizzee Rascal, Avril Lavigne, Katy Perry and Trey Songz while we said goodbye to Jackie Wilson, Marvin Gaye, Count Basie, Richard Burton, and Truman Capote who all died. The police raided the Stander Gang hideout in Houghton killing gang member Patrick McCall and on the opposite end of the spectrum we sam Desmond Tutu being awarded the Nobel Peace prize.

Based on a points system of 30 points for a number 1 position, 29 for number 2 etc down to 1 for position 30, the following are the top 40 chart performers for the year (Note: this does not necessarily reflect sales):

Pos	Song	Artist	Points
1	Clap-Clap Sound	Klaxons	662
2	I Want to Break Free	Queen	649
3	Red Red Wine	UB40	630
4	To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before	Julio Iglesias	600
5	Islands in the Stream	Kenny Rogers	590
6	Self Control	Laura Branigan	573
7	Karma Chameleon	Culture Club	523
8	Manuel Goodbye	Audrey Landers	519
9	Footloose	Kenny Loggins	454
10	99 Red Balloons	Nena	436
11	Happy Station	Fun Fun	433
12	Girls Just Want to Have Fun	Cyndi Lauper	429
13	All Night Long (All Night)	Lionel Richie	422
14	Jump	Van Halen	418
=15	Major Tom	Peter Schilling	406
=15	Break My Stride	Matthew Wilder	406
17	What’s Love Got to do with It	Tina Turner	398
18	Dolce Vita	Ryan Paris	388
19	Big in Japan	Alphaville	382
20	Ghostbusters	Ray Parker Jr.	360
21	Sunshine Reggae	Laid Back	353
22	Dancing in the Dark	Bruce Springsteen	346
23	Reggae Night	Jimmy Cliff	344
24	Say Say Say	Paul McCartney	333
25	Somebody’s Watching Me	Rockwell	329
=24	I Just Called to Say I Love You	Stevie Wonder	326
=24	Love of the Common People	Paul Young	326
25	Colour My Love	Fun Fun	321
29	Radio Ga Ga	Queen	311
30	Hello	Lionel Richie	307
31	Catch Me (I’m Falling in Love)	Marsha Raven	306
32	Tonight, I Celebrate My Love	Peabo Bryson	301
33	Hold Me Now	Thompson Twins	290
34	Susanna	Art Company	277
35	Careless Whisper	George Michael	272
=36	When Doves Cry	Prince	269
-36	Boys do Fall in Love	Robin Gibb	269
=38	Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go	Wham!	265
=38	Where is My Man?	Eartha Kitt	265
40	Earthquake	Flirtations	260

You can compare this to the list published in Top 40 magazine in 1989 which can be found here:

Top 40 Magazine 1984 List