Played momentous role

IT was with deep sadness and an extreme sense of loss that Nelson Mandela University received the news of the passing of one of the colossal figures of the struggle for the liberation of South Africa, Mama Nomzamo Winifred Zanyiwe Madikizela-Mandela.

She was a stalwart in the fight for equality, and played a substantial and momentous role in the liberation of the people of South Africa.

Her courage, strength and tenacity saw her gallantly fight against the apartheid system that had for decades institutionally oppressed the majority of South Africans.

Born in Bizana, Eastern Cape, Madikizela-Mandela showed exceptional leadership skills from a young age.

She obtained a diploma in social work at a time when there were irrational constrictions imposed by the apartheid system on the education of black people and, in particular, black women.

An inspirational trailblazer with a passion for the development of black communities, she turned down a scholarship to study abroad and instead took up a post as the first black qualified medical social worker at Soweto’s Baragwanath Hospital.

She earned the title mother of the nation when she heroically held the fort, often at great personal sacrifice and suffering, and continued the work that anti-apartheid activists, including Nelson Mandela and other ANC leaders, had started before their imprisonment on Robben Island.

At the height of resistance in the 1970s, when the liberation struggle was taken up by the country’s young people, she became the mother figure to the surging student movement and held a soft spot for youth activism even in her latter days.

This is in part the reason she was admired and remained popular on university campuses, including ours.

Her passing comes as she had just been invited to attend the historic inauguration of NMU’s first black African female vice-chancellor, Prof Sibongile Muthwa, and chancellor Dr Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi later this month.

Nelson Mandela University extends its heartfelt condolences to the Madikizela and Mandela extended families.

Nelson Mandela University