Tribute to Mxenges
EC celebrates Human Rights Day near KWT
HUMAN Rights were placed in the forefront during a provincial Human Rights Day celebration at KwaRayi village near King William’s Town at the weekend.
The event celebrated the life and legacy of human rights activists Griffiths Mxenge and his wife Victoria.
More than 500 people from King William’s Town and surrounding areas, including pupils of local and nearby schools, attended Sunday’s event.
The activities started with a briefing session at the Mxenge Homestead, followed by a wreath laying at the Mxenge gravesite.
A church service was held at the Rayi United Congregational Church before the main programme began, with MEC for Sport, Recreation, Arts and Culture Pemmy Majodina as the programme director.
Among the other guests were Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality executive mayor Xola Pakati, MEC of Rural Development and Agrarian Reform Mlibo Qoboshiyane in the capacity as acting Eastern Cape premier, advocate Bulelani Ngcuka and Cogta Minister Dr Zweli Mkhize, with the latter as the guest speaker.
Other stakeholders and partners present were representatives of Interfaith, South African Human Rights Lawyers, Commissioner for Gender Equality, the Amathole Museum, University of Fort Hare, the departments of Home Affairs and Health and the South African Police Services.
Members of the Mxenge family were the guests of honour, with Mbasa Mxenge thanking the government for the initiative.
“We as the family are indeed appreciative to the government for honouring this event and value their efforts and commitments from the bottom of our hearts.”
Most speakers touched on the lives of the Mxenge couple and gave tributes for their selfless sacrifices and commitment to the betterment of others during the apartheid era.
Mxenge, who was born in KwaRayi, a rural settlement outside King William’s Town on February 27 1935, was a civil rights lawyer, ANC member and an antiapartheid activist.
His wife Victoria Nonyamezelo Mxenge was born in Tamara Village in King in January 1942, attended Forbes Grant Secondary School in Ginsberg, matriculated from Healdtown High in 1959 and graduated as a nurse at Victoria Hospital in 1964.
In 1981, she obtained a law degree from Unisa and joined her husband’s law firm in Durban, and was subsequently admitted as a lawyer.
Later in the same year, on November 19, her husband was assassinated after he was abducted, stabbed and beaten to death. His mutilated body was found next to the Umlazi Stadium south of Durban.
She was later murdered in front of her children on the driveway of her home in Umlazi.