Son of the soil Kalaote slain in foreign land
THE June 16 1976 national student uprising not only placed the liberation struggle on an irreversible gear but also affected the generation behind it differently.
Oupa Molehe Kalaote died on Easter Weekend in California, US, aged 51. According to the local Contra Costa Times newspaper, a fourtime felon has been charged with Kalaote ’ s death.
Kalaote was found dead inside his home in Oakland on April 2. He had been struck on the head with a crowbar. According to the paper, the two men had known each other for a year.
Kalaote was 12 years of age when Soweto exploded to a nationwide revolt in 1976. Born on June 6 1964, Kalaote was the third-born child of Seroadi Esther and David Kalaote.
He was raised by his grandmother, MmaKalaote, in Klerksdorp in the North West. He last attended school at Barolong high in Mafikeng in Standard 7.
Kalaote left for exile, joining the ANC in Botswana in 1980, and meeting some of the leaders of the banned Soweto Students Representative Council, who had now reorganised themselves under the banner of the South African Youth Revolutionary Council.
He later left Botswana for Zimbabwe, where he joined the PAC. Deeply troubled by divisions within the liberation movements, Kalaote felt disillusioned and – in a message posted on the internet that was titled The Cry – he said he then decided to go to the US “to face the belly of beast ”.
There, not only was he exposed to the influence of Malcolm X, but he also met his wife, Maki, a US citizen whom he named Dimakatso and with whom they had three girls. The “back to Africa ” exponent Marcus Garvey also had a great impression on him for his call for the establishment of the United States of Africa.
With the dawn of democracy in 1994, he vowed to amass enough wealth so he could come back home at 6250 in Zone 4 Diepkloof, Soweto, an independent man. This was not to be. Kalaote was buried in Oakland, US, on Wednesday. – Additional reporting by Victor Mecoamere