Biography Index

Photographer

Member of the ANC, helped draft the ANC's Code of Conduct and statutes, member of the Constitutional Committee and National Executive Committee of the ANC, Director of Research for the Ministry of Justice, Constitutional Court Judge and author

Socialist, organised shop assistants on the Witwatersrand into a trade union, honorary secretary of the Shop Assistants trade union, member of the CPSA, elected to the national executive committee of the South African Trade and Labour Co

A member of the South African Communist Party and the CTTU

A member of the Communist Party of South Africa

Photographer

Minor, Worker, Casualty

Pharmacist and Honorary Life President of the South African Optometeric Association

Served on the United Transkeian Territories General Council and the Transkeian Territorial Authority but was defeated for election to the Transkeian Legislative Assembly in 1963, schoolmaster turned farmer and businessman, was active in support of the Cape Native Voters' Association, executive member of the (AAC)

Banished person

Teacher and political activist, involved in the South African Indian Congress, Treasurer of the United Democratic Front, Member of Parliament (post 1994), founding member of Johannesburg’s Market Theatre and the alternative theatre group the ‘Phoenix players’.

Legal clerk, political activist, Transvaal Indian Congress member, fourth person to die in police custody for political actvity

British writer and journalist, editor of Drum magazine in Johannesburg during the 1950s

Singer, performer, Co-Director at Mzanzi Cultural Industries 

A part of the Guardian newspaper and the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA)

A member of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA)

Sculptor

exile, Professor of Sociology, member of the ANC and Chair of the Public Service Commission.

artist

Minor, Worker, Casualty

Author, activist, civil servant, teacher, television producer

Architect

Member of Parliament in the Cape, Minister of Native Affairs and Commissioner of Public Works.

South African photographer and artist

A member of the South African Congress of Democrats (COD)

A trade unionist

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP)

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP)

Shopsteward, Secretary and Organizer of the central branch of the GWU of South Africa

fxecuted Boer Commando leader and folk legend

Member of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), the Springbok Legion, South African Communist Party (SACP) and uMkhonto weSizwe (MK)

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP)

author, sociologist, political analyst, Professor, Dean of Social Sciences, Director of Centre for Social and Development Studies at Natal University (now UKZN), chair of the Wits Centre for Policy Studies, founding member of the Academy of Science of

MK Gandhi’s South African Secretary

Pioneer missionary in South Africa and founder of the first Protestant mission station in Southern Africa.

A member of the African Resistance Movement (ARM). Lived in exile.

Member of COD and activist

An African National Congress (ANC) member and a trade unionist

Feminist writer

Prime Minister of the Cape Colony, anti-British imperialist, lawyer, joined the Cape Parliament as representative of Kimberley, appointed Attorney General by Cecil John Rhodes

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP)

Member of NUSAS, ANC, SACP and MK, secretary of the United Women's Organisation of the Western Cape (UWO).

attorney, barrister (Member of Middle Temple) in London, United Kingdom, advocate at the South African Bar, political anti-apartheid opposition leader, Chair of the federal executiveof the Progressive Reform Party, defence lawyer in Rivonia Trial, Memb

Photographer

Ordained Anglican preacher, Anti-Apartheid Activist, Special Representative of the Herero people at the United Nations, founding member of the African Bureau, arrested for his participation in the 1946 Passive Resistance Campaign in Durban, negotiated the return of Tshkedi and Seretse Khama to Botswana, helped broker a cease-fire be the people of Nagaland and the Indian Government.

Artist

Composer, dramatist, impresario and South African theatrical pioneer in the English language

Visual Artist

Political activist, President of SSRC

Headmaster, assistant school inspector, advisor to the Paramount Chief Bazindlo Sandile, held the educational and agricultural portfolio in the Ciskei Territorial Authority, member of the Ciskei legislative Assembly and Chief Minister in 1973

Banned person.

Agricultural officer, trade union organiser, National Executive Committee member of SACTU, member of the African National Congress, 1956 Treason Trialist.

Artist and painter

Teacher, active in the Kimberley ANC

Member of the South African Black Scholars Association, youth organizerat the Churches Urban Planning Commission (CUPC), employed at the Department of Labour in the Western Cape

Member of the ANC and MK, Chief director of equal opportunities in the South African National Defence Force and Major General

Founder member of the Liberal Study Group, elected secretary of the Communist Party of South Africa in Durban, member of the Natal Indian Congress, Liberal Study Group, India League, National Protest Day Committee (1950), and Stalin Memorial Committee, founder of the Indian Shop Assistant’s Union, banned person, political prisoner, listed in the United States of America Congress Report of 500 ‘most dangerous’ communists in the world in 1950, Treason Trialist in 1956, banned person, political prisoner

Member of the Communist Party in Cape Town and after her marriage became a member of the Natal Indian Congress and the ANC. First jailed in 1946 for her role in the passive resistance in Durban, jailed for the second time in 19

Attorney, political prisoner, Natal Indian Congress treasurer, member of the Democratic Lawyers Association, first black member elected as a council member of the Natal Law Society, past chairman of the Global Organisation of People of Indian Origin (GOPIO), trustee of the Gandhi Development Trust, member of the editorial board of Satyagraha newspaper, chair of the Mota Varachha Trust and chairman of the Freedom Park Trust History Durban Committee.
 

His Majesty, King Moshoeshoe II of Lesotho

Founder member of AZASO, Member of the ANC,   medical doctor, lecturer, member of Witwatersrand University Council, national deputy minister of health.

A south african publisher

Principal, a member of the ANC and banished person

ANC member in Newclare

Banished person.

Banished person

Banned person.

Banished Person

King of the Marota people (Bapedi)

Chief of Batlokwa

Chief of Batlokwa

South African artist and musician

Emperor of Ethiopia, exiled leader, Commander of Ethiopian Army, Messiah figure for Rastafarian religion

High Commissioner in South Africa, and Governor of the Transvaal and Orange River Colony.

Freedom fighter.

ANC Youth League head in exile, Member of the African National Congress, Member of Parliament, Director-General of the Department of Foreign Affairs, National Police Commissioner and President of Interpol

Accused in the 1956 Treason Trial, Sergeant in the South African army in World War II, Member of Springbok Legion and of the ANC, insurance agent

Artist

Lawyer, journalist, author member of the SANNC, launched the SANNC newspaper, Abantu Batho, President-General of the ANC

Caster Semenya, one of the premier South African atheltes has been running since an early age. Setting multiple world records she has truly been an inspiration for South Africans

Artist

Banished person

Banished person

Banished person

Banished person

Novelist and poet

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP), African National Congress (ANC) and  The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM), based in the United Kingdom.

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP), The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM) and the African National Congress (ANC).

South African athlete of international stature, who became a Commonwealth Games and Olympic Games Silver Medallist

Trade Unionist, Deputy President COSATU, member of the ANC and Member of Parliament, Minister of Human Settlements. 

Trade unionist, General Secretary of the South African Coloured People's Organisation, Secretary of the Franchise Action Council, 1956 Treason Trialist, political prisoner, executive member of the SACP and the ANC, member of the ANC's Revolutionary Cou

First African woman member of the Communist Party of South Africa in Langa, member of the African National Congress Womens League, Federation of South African Women, founder of the Langa Women’s Vigilance Association, national vice-president of the National Council of African Women (NCAW) and political prisoner

Poet, novelist, political activist, exile, member of the Black Consciousness Movement and African National Congress, Commander in uMkhonto weSizwe and Member of Parliament

Teacher, butcher, executive member of the All African Convention and the ANC,ran successfully for election to the Natives' Representative Council in 1949, winning the Cape rural constituency, President of the Location Advisory Boards Congress

Golfer

Lawyer, President of the NIC, banned, politcal detainee, member of the UDF

ANC political activist, former premier of Gauteng Province and currently Minister of Human Settlements

Musician

Sculptor

Member of the ANC and MK, exiled person, Robben Island prisoner, Treasurer of Lamontville Youth Congress

Secretary for the Federation of South African Women (FEDSAW) and the Federation of Transvaal Women; member of the Anti-Republic Campaign Committee; Release Mandela Campaign Committee; organiser and administrator for the Amalgamated Black Worker's Project; representative of the Transport and General Workers' Union (T and GWU); member of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) National Women's Subcommittee; African National Congress’s (ANC) National Election Steering Committee; Member of Parliament; Deputy Minister of Minerals and Energy; ANC National Working Committee; member of National Executive Council (NEC) of the ANC; Deputy Minister of Safety and Security; Minister of Women in the Presidency of the Republic of South Africa; Minister of Social Development.

Activist with the ANC and SACTU

Volunteer in the Defiance Campaign. Active in student affairs at University of the Witwatersrand

Member of the ANC and MK and medical doctor

Artist

First Black beauty queen to represent South Africa at Miss World pageant, veteran actress and model 

Arrested and detained for political activities

Member of the CPSA and was active in the Party-inspired Anti–Fascist League, serving as its Natal secretary. During the Second World War, Shanley was the secretary of the Natal section of Trades and Labour Council. Secretary of the Suga

A journalist for the Guardian news paper and a member of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA)

Cartoonist and activist

A member of the African National Congress (ANC)

Foremost historian of Cape slavery, Nelson Mandela Chair of African Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) in New Delhi 2003, author of acclaimed book on Cape slavery, Children of Bondage, husband of Dr Sandra Rowoldt-Shell and father of Elisabeth Rozalette Shell.

British South African statesman, an administrator of native affairs, who was responsible for the annexation of the Transvaal in 1877.

British South African statesman, Administrator of Native Affairs, responsible for the annexation of the Transvaal in 1877

Member of COSAS, COSATU ANC and the SACP, MEC for Local Government in Gauteng, Minister of the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs

OPO, SWAPO and SWALA member, who was sentenced to life imprisonment on Robben Island for his role as an activist

Artist

Political activist, PAC Member, Chairperson of ASUS, member of Makana Football Club

Diplomat, military specialist, for his contribution to the struggle against apartheid and attainment of a democratic, non-racial and non-sexist South Africa, and promoting friendship ties, joint cooperation programmes and projects between Russia and po

A member of the Institute for Industrial Education.

MK  field commander, Director Personnel Planning of the SANDF, Director of Integration when MK, APLA and SADF were merged to form the SANDF, commanded the South African Development Countries forces during Operation Boleas in Lesotho, Major General and the Chief Director Human Resources Support, Chief of the SA Army

acting chairman of the Transvaal Council of Non-European Trade Unions, Treason  trialist

Chairman the African Laundry Workers' Union, acting chairman of the Transvaal Council of Non-European Trade Unions, General Secretary of the South African

Teacher, member of the ANC, chairperson of the Central Western Jabavu Branch of the Federation of South African Women (FEDSAW).

Organised farm workers, member of the ANC, accused in the Treason Trial of 1956,  helped expose working condtions in Bethal, provincial president of the Transvaal ANC

Artist

Journalist, insurance agent, political prisoner, exiled person, member of the PAC leader, PAC's chief representative in East Africa, head of the PAC's mission to Europe and the Americas, PAC's permanent observer at the United Nations

Artist

Artist

Photographer

Visual Artist

Political activist, minister, chairman and founding official of SANROC, trade unionist, sportsman, educator. 

Member of the African National Congress Youth League, member of the Transkei Legislative Assembly,  Minister of Roads and Works and over the next 20 years handled several ministerial portfolios, including energy, education, interior and posts and telecommunications. Instrumental in having single mothers granted land ownership rights in the Transkei, appointed to the cabinet of George Matanzima as Minister of Telecommunications, Prime Minister of the Transkei,member of the national executive committee of the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa (Contralesa), headed the ANC Women's League in the Transkei. Served on the Transitional Executive Councilsub-council on foreign affairs. Appointed Minister of Public Enterprises in Government. Member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC

Ezra Mvuyisa Sigwela is currently the South African Ambassador in Rwanda.

Member of the ANC and MK, Lecturer, Commissioner in the Stuart Commission and First Director General National Intelligence Agency.

artist, teacher 

Teacher, political activist, member of NEUM, Cape African Teachers Association (CATA) and founder member of APDUSA.

Journalist, author, TV producer, editor, member of the ANC, worked for the National Intelligence Agency and the SABC

Leader of the Location Advisory Boards Congress in Durban, and prominent in the All African Convention, elected to the Natives' Representative Council in 1937,  member of the ANC's National Executive Committee,  Provincial secretary of the Natal ANC

Member of the ANC, member of the executive committee of the Federation of South African Women (FEDSAW), defendant in the 1956 Treason trial, president of the Cape Town ANC Women’s League

One of the first African recruits to the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), he joined the Young Communist League in 1923,  teacher, helped organise the Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union (ICU), organiser for the African National Congress (ANC) 

Teacher, assistant secretary of the Natal ANC, he led the first batch of Durban volunteers in the Defiance Campaign, member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC, provincial treasurer  and later secretary of the Natal

Member of the ANC and uMkhonto we Sizwe and Student activist.

LGBTQI+ activist, member of the South African national women’s soccer team (Banyana Banyana)

Taught African law and administration at the University of Cape Town, charged for sedition in 1946 mineworkers strike, member of the central committee of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), banned person, scholar and author

Secretary of the South African Communist Party and Trade Union stalwart, General Secretary of the Food and Canning Workers Uninon, founding member of the Federation of South African Women (FEDSAW), author, recipient of the ANC's Isithwalandwe Award

An Academic.

Founder member and first president of the Black Sash in 1955, led the organization until 1975, recipient of the Government's Order of the Baobab in Silver

Musician 

A lawyer and a member of the South African Congress of Democrats (COD)

Teacher, farmer, secretary of the Anti-Segregation Council, secretary of the Passive Resistance Council of the Natal Indian Congress. He was imprisoned during the passive resistance campaign and again during the Defiance Campaign&nb

Lawyer, secretary of the Transvaal Passive Resistance Council. Member of the executive committee of both the Natal Indian Congress (NIC) and the South Afri

Chairman of Military Committee in Maputo, Robben island prisoner, exile, member of uMkhonto weSizwe, ANC Representative in Holland

South African Artist

banished person

journalist, President of Media Workers Association of South Africa, business executive, former SABC CEO, 

Albertina Sisulu 'the mother of the nation', activist and nurse, who has struggled for her whole life human rights and dignity.

ANC Political Activist 

South African anti-apartheid activist, member of the African National Congress and one of the foremost influences in South African politics. 

Secretary of the Pretoria branch of the TIC, involved the Indian Passive Resistance Movement, member of the executives of the Transvaal Indian Congress and the Transvaal Passive Resistance Council, President of the Transvaal Indian Congress, 

South African sculptor hailed by some critics as Africa’s major Black sculptor

mathematics lecturer, political prisoner, member of ANC, SACP and MK, Natal Chairperson of Operation Vula 

Exiled person, MK Commissar, Robben Island prisoner, member of the African National Congress and South African Communist Party and South African National Defence Force

Anglican priest, member of the ANC national executive committee,  ANC chaplain,and helped to organise volunteers for the Defiance Campaign of 1952 in his Aliwal North. He later became inactive in the Congress movement and joined the Liberal Party

Teacher, member of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), a permanent representative of the IFP in London,  committee member of the Reconstruction and Development Programme in government, Minister of Correctional Services

Clerk, journalist, court interpreter, and businessman, one of the founders of the ANC newspaper, Abantu-Batho, and served as its editor in the late 1920s, secretary-general of the ANC, member of the executive committee of t

Painter and woodcutter

Enslaved person, school master and healer at the Slave Lodge in Cape Town.

South African cricket captain and opening batsman. Youngest cricket captain in South African history. First to reach one hundred test caps as captain in the world.

Part of the The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM) based in the United Kingdom

Part of the Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM) bused in te United Kingdom.

A member of the Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM), African National Congress (ANC) and the South African Communist Party (SACP)

A Teacher involved with the Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM)

Member of the African National Congress, member of the Executive Committee of the Black People’s Convention, founding member of the United Democratic Front, co-chair of the Anti-President’s Council Committee, political prisoner, co-chair of

Margaret Smith was an ichthyologist, painter, musician, museologist and an academic. She illustrated the book Sea Fishes of Southern Africa, which was written by her husband Prof James Leonard Brierley Smith

journalist, news editor, political prisoner

Politician, world-famed statesman, soldier, naturalist, philosopher and former Prime Minister of South Africa

A member of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA)

Part of the Guardian

Advocate, Queens Council, member of the Central Committee of the CPSA

First king of the Swazi 

Teacher, lecturer, lawyer,  Fort Hare University SRC President, secretary of the ANC branch in Standerton, founding member and first president of the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) and Robben Island prisoner. 

Political activist and health practitioner

Magistrate, labour bureau agent and a road inspector, journalist, founder and secretary of the Bantu Union, a Cape voters' association

Scottish and a wife of Tiyo Soga a South Africa Presbyterian.

Writer

Minor, Worker, Casualty

Socialist, political activist, librarian and treasurer and bursary committee member of the Cape Peninsula Students Union, Robben Island prisoner, banned person

Photographer and member of Afrapix

Miner, Worker, Marikana Casuality

President of the International Cricket Council (ICC), South Africa’s leading cricket administrator and an advocate by profession

Businessman and soccer player

President of the South African Student Organisation (SASO) from 1971 until 3 July 1972 and co-founder of the BPC. Academic, author and a Member of Parliament for Gauteng Legislature and National Deputy president of the Independent Democrats.

Choirmaster, poet, preacher, composer and author of the first stanza of "Nkosi Sikelel ‘iAfrika," the anthem South Africa adopted after its first democratic elections in 1994

Bookkeeper, store manager, passive resister, barrister, political prisoner

 Journalist, a member of uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK)

Anti- apartheid journalist, broadcaster, writer
 

Gordon Sprigg (1830-1913) was a British colonial administrator and Prime Minister of the Cape Colony in four separate terms: 1878-1881, 1886-1890, 1896-1898 and 1900-1904. Sprigg was a supporter of federation rather than of a Union for South Africa.

Sculptor and art lecturer

Magistrate, Representative of the Cape Province in the Natives Land Commission, Secretary of Native Affairs, Under-Secretary of Native Affairs, Senator in the Union of South Africa.

A member of the Liberal Party of South Africa (LPSA) and the Black Sash, political prisoner, worked at Defence and Aid, London, lecturer at Makerere University, in Uganda, teaching theology and caring for students, secretary of the World Conference of Religions for Peace, social worker and theologian

Conscientious Objector, Pacifist, Anti-conscription Activist, Leader of End Constriction Campaign, Baptist, Homeopath

member of SACPO, exile, active in SANROC

Writer, editor of Drum magazine from 1955- 8 and publisher

A member of the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS).

Artist

advocate, lecturer, writer, judge, former head of the Urban Foundation

Engineer, researcher, professor, author, for his contribution to and achievements in chemistry and biosynthesis of Mycotoxins was awarded The Order of Mapungubwe in Silver

South African Artist (painter and graphic artist)

A member of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA) and the South African Congress of Democrats (COD)

Founding member of the Liberal Party, Anti-apartheid activist, President of the Black Sash and Founding member of the Women’s Movement for Peace.

A member of the South African Communist Party (SACP)

Prime Minister of South Africa, secretary of the National Party

Anti-apartheid cleric and published Steve Biko's collected writings

Leader of the Khoi people, banished person

Emeritus Professor at the University of South Africa and author

Parliamentarian, Human Rights Activist, sole representative of opposition party (the Progressive Party) in parliament during apartheid

Schoolteacher, magistrate's clerk, advocate, farmer, lecturer, last Governor-General of the Union of South Africa, secretary of the OFS Referees' Association, Chief whip of the National Party, Minister of Justice, Minister of Education.

Co-founder the Community Arts Workshop in Durban