Respected scholar and historian
First student in Venda to pass matric
Born: July 18 1931
Died: July 15
Funeral: Today at Mbilwi Evangelical Lutheran Church, from 6.30am
Burial: At the local cemetery Celebrated Venda historian and author, Dr Henry Mphaya Nemudzivhadi, will be laid to rest today. He died on Sunday after a long illness – just four days before his 86th birthday.
Born in 1931 at Mukula village, Nemudzivhadi attended Takalani School from 1943 where he passed his Standard 6 (now Grade 8) in 1949.
He proceeded to the Vendaland Institute in Tshakhuma and obtained a first-class pass in the junior certificate examination in 1952.
The students at the institute were fortunate because in 1953 the matriculation course was introduced and Nemudzivhadi became one of the nine students who started the course under difficult conditions.
Instead of doing six subjects offered by the institution, Nemudzivhadi also studied botany on his own against the advice of the principal, who thought he would not make it without a teacher.
But, this was not a problem for him because he knew that he can rely on his textbooks.
When the class sat for final examinations in 1954, Nemudzivhadi passed all seven subjects in one sitting and obtained a matric exemption – becoming the first student to pass matric in a Venda secondary school.
In 1955, Nemudzivhadi enrolled with the Pretoria Bantu Normal College [the predecessor of the University of the North] to train secondary school teachers.
A year later, he studied for an advanced teacher’s diploma . He started teaching at the Vendaland Institute in 1957 but had continued his studies and completed a BA degree in the same year.
From 1958, he taught at Mphaphuli High School where he offered lessons in arithmetic, Venda, English, Afrikaans and psychology in the senior classes. He was also a sports organiser at the school.
In 1960, he married Dorothy Masekela who was both a nurse and a teacher.
After teaching for seven years, Nemudzivhadi became a supervisor of schools in the Louis Trichardt east circuit.
From 1972 to 1974, he served as a circuit inspector of Mutshindudi and Vhuilafuri.
Between 1975 and 1979, he was attached to the head office of the Department of Education in Pretoria as education planner and chief inspector, and from 1981 to 1991 he was both secretary-general and director-general in the presidency in the Venda homeland as well as in the homeland’s departments of welfare and pension and transport.
Nemudzivhadi is survived by his wife, five children – two daughters and three sons – and 11 grandchildren.