Some of the most effective actions in support of the divestment of University investments in U.S. companies doing business in South Africa took place between the years of 1976–1985, as Sevilla travelled throughout the American Continent and Europe gathering support for the overthrow of the South African Apartheid Government, which also led to his arrest at U.C. Berkeley on several occasions in the successful effort to force the University of California to divest all of their investments in companies doing business in South Africa, which also became the driving force for divestment worldwide in all companies doing business in the country of Apartheid South Africa. For example, in April 1986, 61 students were arrested after building a shantytown in front of the chancellor's office at UC Berkeley. The leading South Africa divestment activist at Occidental College in Los Angeles was future US president Barack Obama.