Govan Mbeki
Govan Archibald Mvuyelwa Mbeki was born 9 July 1910 and passed away on 30 August 2001 at the age of 91. He was the father of South Africa's second democratically elected president, Thabo Mbeki.
Govan Mbeki or Oom (Uncle) Gov was educated at mission schools before attending the University of Fort Hare. He studied a Bachelor of Arts degree in politics; and psychology and a teaching diploma finishing in 1936.
After turning his hand at teaching where he was constantly fired for his political activities, he began to help peasants organise rural cooperatives. He also produced a pamphlet detailing his actions and how to go about replicating his successes.
As he was a firm believer in communism until his last days, he saw in South Africa's rural areas the potential for a great agrarian revolutionary force. Another role he fulfilled was as an editor of New Age, a national newspaper that opposed the Apartheid system. Here he chronicled the various uprisings against Apartheid in peasant struggles in Pondoland and Sekhukhuneland and from it produced his first book, South Africa: The Peasants' Revolt.
As the Apartheid regime began to intensify its campaign against liberation movements the New Age was banned. Mbeki was forced to go underground. He was now a leader in the South African Communist Party (SACP). He also worked at forging the links between the SAC, ANC and organise labour that continues today in the Tripartite Alliance.
On 11 July 1963, on a farm called Liliesleaf Farm in a suburb of Johannesburg that goes by the name of Rivonia, Apartheid security forces arrested Govan Mbeki. He was meeting with other stalwarts of the struggle such as Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela, Harold Wolpe and Ahmed Kathrada.
This raid by the security forces led to the most famous mock trial of the Apartheid era, which ended with all the defendants bar one being sentenced to life imprisonment. This did not deter anyone in the struggle or those who had been sentenced. They instead took their teachings into the cells and turned the prisons into universities.
Released in 1987, a few years before Mandela, Govan Mbeki rejoined the struggle. In addition, in 1994, in the country's first all-race elections, he won a seat in Parliament and became the deputy president of the Senate, while his son, Thabo Mbeki, became deputy president, under Nelson Mandela.
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Page Last Updated 8 April 2010
