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Lilliesleaf Farm
Liliesleaf Farm, also spelt Lilliesleaf and also known simply as Liliesleaf, is a location in northern Johannesburg, South Africa, which is most noted for its use as a safe house for African National Congress (ANC) activists during the apartheid years in the 1960s. In 1963, the South African police raided the farm, arresting more than a dozen ANC leaders and activists, who were then tried and prosecuted during the Rivonia Trial. After the end of apartheid, the property was restored and turned into a museum and national heritage site. It was closed to visitors in September 2021, but was scheduled to reopen a year later. History The farmhouse is located on George Avenue in Rivonia, once a remote spot in a country village, now a suburb around north of Johannesburg, in the Sandton area. In 1961, the property was purchased by Arthur Goldreich and Harold Wolpe with funds from the underground South African Communist Party, to use as a safe house for political fugitives. Goldreich liv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Howick, South Africa
Howick is a town located in the UMngeni Local Municipality of KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa. The town is 1050 m above sea level, and about 88 kilometres from the port city of Durban. It experiences warm summers and cool, dry winters. A snappy chill descends upon Howick when snow falls on the nearby Drakensberg. The town is located on the N3 freeway, connecting it with the rest of South Africa. The town is the location of Howick Falls, which is a large waterfall that occurs when the Umgeni River falls 95 metres (311 feet) over dolerite cliffs on its way to the Indian Ocean. The waterfall was known as kwaNogqaza or "The Place of the Tall One" by the original Zulu inhabitants. There are several other waterfalls in the vicinity and all of them have claimed human lives. Near Howick are Cascade Falls (25 m) and Shelter Falls (37 m), while Karkloof Falls (105 m) is 16 km to the east. There are also a number of schools in Howick, including Howick High School. Hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lionel Bernstein
Lionel "Rusty" Bernstein (20 March 1920 – 23 June 2002) was a Jewish South African anti-apartheid activist and political prisoner. He played a key role in political organizations such as the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the African National Congress (ANC). He helped form the South African Congress of Democrats to bolster white participation in the ANC, and he brought its allies together to establish a Congress of the People, working closely with Nelson Mandela. The anti-apartheid movement drew the ire of the South African government. They imposed severe restrictions on the movement, such as banning a publication Bernstein edited, banning a party he organized with, and detaining leaders including him for long periods of time. These actions culminated in him fleeing his home country after being detained following a police raid. To participate in the first post-apartheid elections in 1994, he returned to South Africa and resumed working for the ANC. Many instituti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joe Slovo
Yossel Mashel "Joe" Slovo (23 May 1926 – 6 January 1995) was a South African politician and Internal resistance to apartheid, anti-apartheid activist. A Marxist-Leninist, he was a long-time leader and theorist in the South African Communist Party (SACP), a leading member of the African National Congress (ANC), and a commander of the ANC's military wing uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK). Slovo was a delegate to the multiracial Congress of the People (1955), Congress of the People of June 1955 which drew up the Freedom Charter. He was imprisoned for six months in 1960, and emerged as a leader of uMkhonto we Sizwe the following year. He lived in exile from 1963 to 1990, conducting operations against the apartheid régime from the United Kingdom, Angola, Mozambique, and Zambia. In 1990, he returned to South Africa, and took part in the negotiations that ended apartheid. He became known for proposing the "sunset clauses" covering the 5 years following a democratic election, including ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ruth First
Heloise Ruth First OLG (4 May 1925 – 17 August 1982) was a South African anti-apartheid activist and scholar. She was assassinated in Mozambique, where she was working in exile, by a parcel bomb built by South African police. Family and education Ruth First was born 4 May 1925 in Johannesburg to her Jewish parents, Julius First and Matilda Leveta. Julius emigrated to South Africa from Latvia when he was 10 years old, and Matilda emigrated from Lithuania when she was four years old. They were both anti-apartheid activists and became founding members of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), the forerunner of the South African Communist Party (SACP). Ruth First was brought up in Kensington where she and her brother, Ronald First, were raised in a highly political household. At age 14, Ruth was a member of the Young Left Wing Book Club. Like her parents, she joined the Communist Party, which was allied with the African National Congress in its struggle to overthrow the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Kantor
James Kantor (26 February 1927 – 2 February 1974) was a South African lawyer and writer. James Kantor was born in Johannesburg to a Jewish family. A prominent Johannesburg lawyer in the 1950s, Kantor was attorney for Nelson Mandela and imprisoned with him during the Rivonia Trial. He later immigrated to England and wrote an autobiography. Rivonia Trial Kantor was one of the defence lawyers in the Rivonia Trial until his brother-in-law and legal partner Harold Wolpe, one of the accused, managed to escape. At this stage, Kantor was himself arrested and charged with the same crimes as Nelson Mandela, Mandela and the other defendants although he had no involvement with the ANC or Umkhonto we Sizwe, MK. Harold Hanson (lawyer), Harold Hanson and Harry Schwarz, a close friend and a well-known politician, stepped in to act as his defence lawyers in the trial. After aggressive treatment by the prosecutor Percy Yutar, who sought to portray Kantor as a vital cog of MK, finally Ju ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrew Mlangeni
Andrew Mokete Mlangeni (6 June 192521 July 2020), also known as Percy Mokoena, Mokete Mokoena, and Rev. Mokete Mokoena, was a South African political activist and anti-apartheid campaigner who, along with Nelson Mandela and others, was imprisoned after the Rivonia Trial. Early life Mlangeni was born in Bethlehem, Orange Free State. After having to give up his studies owing to poverty, after 1946 he experienced worker exploitation as a factory worker. When working as a bus driver, he was active in a strike for better working conditions and a living wage, and in 1951, joined the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL). In 1954, he joined the African National Congress (ANC). In 1961, he was sent for military training outside the country, but on his return in 1963 was arrested, after being accused of recruiting and training an armed force. He was found guilty in the Rivonia Trial and sentenced to life imprisonment on Robben Island, where he was Prisoner 467/64. Later life M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elias Motsoaledi
Elias Mathope Motsoaledi OMSG (26 July 1924 – 9 May 1994) was a South African anti-apartheid activist. He was Accused No.9 in the Rivonia Trial and was sentenced to life imprisonment in July 1963 with a group of anti-Apartheid revolutionaries which included Nelson Mandela who was Accused No.1. Early life Elias Motsoaledi was born on 26 July 1924, the third of eight children, in Phokoane in the Nebo District in Sekhukuneland, now Limpopo. He moved to Johannesburg at the age of 17 in search of work. His first brush with the law in Johannesburg was his arrest for failure to produce his pass book, and he was sentenced to work on the construction of a road in Pretoria. Upon his release he got a job in a furniture factory. Activism Trade union movement Motsoaledi joined the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA) in 1945 and then the African National Congress (ANC) in 1948. He soon became involved with trade unions. He joined the Leather Workers' Union in 1949, served as c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Raymond Mhlaba
Raymond Mphakamisi Mhlaba OMSG (12 February 1920 – 20 February 2005) was an anti-apartheid activist, Communist and leader of the African National Congress (ANC) who became the first premier of the Eastern Cape. Mhlaba spent 25 years of his life in prison. Well-known for being sentenced with Nelson Mandela, Govan Mbeki, Walter Sisulu and others in the Rivonia Trial, he was an active member of the ANC and the South African Communist Party (SACP) all his adult life. His kindly manner brought him the nickname "Oom Ray” (“Uncle Ray” in Afrikaans). Personal life Mhlaba was born in Mazoka village in the Fort Beaufort district, Eastern Cape and was educated at Healdtown Mission Institute but had to drop out because of financial problems. Mhlaba started working at a laundry in Port Elizabeth after leaving school in 1942. He met and married his first wife, Joyce Meke, who was also from the Fort Beaufort area in 1943. In their 17 years together, before her death in a ca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Denis Goldberg
Denis Theodore Goldberg (11 April 1933 – 29 April 2020) was a South African social campaigner who was active in the struggle against apartheid. He was accused No. 3 of 11 defendants in the Rivonia Trial of 1964, alongside the better-known Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu. He was the youngest of the defendants. He was convicted and imprisoned for 22 years, along with other key members of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. After his release in 1985, he continued to campaign against apartheid from his base in London with his family. The apartheid system was fully abolished with the 1994 election. He returned to South Africa in 2002 and founded the non-profit Denis Goldberg Legacy Foundation Trust in 2015. He was diagnosed with lung cancer in July 2017, and died in Cape Town on 29 April 2020. Biography Early life Denis Theodore Goldberg was born on 11 April 1933 in Cape Town, South Africa and grew up in a family that welcomed people of all races into their house. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ahmed Kathrada
Ahmed Mohamed Kathrada OMSG (21 August 1929 – 28 March 2017), sometimes known by the nickname "Kathy", was a South African politician and anti-apartheid activist. Kathrada's involvement in the anti-apartheid activities of the African National Congress (ANC) led him to his long-term imprisonment following the Rivonia Trial, in which he was held at Robben Island and Pollsmoor Prison. Following his release in 1990, he was elected to serve as a member of parliament, representing the ANC. He authored a book, ''No Bread for Mandela – Memoirs of Ahmed Kathrada, Prisoner No. 468/64''. Early life Ahmed Kathrada was born on 21 August 1929 in the small country town of Schweizer-Reneke in the Western Transvaal, Kathrada 2004, p. 373 the fourth of six children in a Gujarati Bohra family of South African Indian immigrant parents from Surat, Gujarat. Once in Johannesburg, he was influenced by leaders of the Transvaal Indian Congress such as Dr. Yusuf Dadoo, IC Meer, Moulvi and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Govan Mbeki
Govan Archibald Mvunyelwa Mbeki (9 July 1910 – 30 August 2001) was a South African politician, military commander, Communist leader who served as the Secretary of Umkhonto we Sizwe, at its inception in 1961. He was also the younger son of Chief Skelewu Mbeki and Johanna Mabula and also the father of the former South African president Thabo Mbeki and political economist Moeletsi Mbeki. He was a leader of the South African Communist Party and the African National Congress. After the Rivonia Trial, he was imprisoned (1963–1987) on charges of terrorism and treason, together with Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Raymond Mhlaba, Ahmed Kathrada and other eminent ANC leaders, for their role in the ANC's armed wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK). He was sometimes mentioned by his nickname "Oom Gov". Early years Govan Mbeki was born in the Nqamakwe district of the Transkei region and was a part of the Xhosa ethnic group. As a teenager, Mbeki worked as a newsboy and messenger in the citi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
