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Posted on 06/13/2002 9:04:28 PM PDT by dighton
Peter Mokaba, who has died aged 43, was a hero of the radical youth wing of the ruling African National Congress party, for whom he remained a future leader despite a reputation for unashamed self-indulgence and unceasing controversy.
His role in ANC affairs was guaranteed both by the strong personal support he enjoyed in Limpopo Province, formerly northern Transvaal, and by his position within the increasingly powerful Left-wing, which believed that the “liberation struggle” was still to be won. He was a protege of Winnie Mandela.
When President Nelson Mandela’s ANC government was urgently seeking to establish itself as a proponent of racial reconciliation, Mokaba led crowds in chanting “Kill the Boer, kill the farmer”.
Later, when President Thabo Mbeki came under international pressure because of his controversial views on the link between the HIV virus and Aids, Mokaba declared that HIV did not exist, and that the anti-Aids drugs being plied in South Africa were “poisonous”.
Anti-Aids drugs had no benefits “beyond profits for the pharmaceutical industry”; the fight against these companies, he said, should be waged with the same intensity as the struggle against apartheid. Privately, he assured supporters that the HIV virus and Aids were part of an “international Western plot” to decimate blacks and “regain colonial control” in Africa.
After falling ill three years ago with an undiagnosed respiratory problem, and being given indefinite leave from parliament, Mokaba furiously rejected rumours that he was himself suffering from Aids.
Peter Mokaba was born on January 7 1959 into a poor labouring family in a home-made shack at Mankweng, near Pietersburg, in northern Transvaal. He channelled his enthusiasm into the burgeoning youthful rebellion against the apartheid system of that time, and was expelled from his school as a troublemaker before completing matriculation.
Later, he made an effort to gain his basic educational qualifications while working as a garden boy to pay his way.
His natural leadership qualities were manifested when he organised a school boycott as part of the “revolutionary struggle” against apartheid in his home area. “No education before liberation” was the catch-phrase of the era.
In 1987 he was elected president of the South African Youth Congress (Sayco) and became a founder member of the Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa. He soon featured prominently on the wanted lists of the security police, was repeatedly arrested, and twice jailed for “subversive activities”.
Once the ban on the ANC was lifted, Sayco was replaced by the ANC Youth League. Mokaba was the only obvious candidate for the movement’s presidency, and he held the post until the advent of black majority rule in 1994.
He used the power base to become one of the ANC’s first members of parliament. President Mandela bowed to his regional popularity by appointing him deputy minister of environment affairs and tourism.
Mokaba soon made his first embarrassing mark by decrying the “social imbalance” in South Africa’s tourist industry, and advocating that a massive levy be imposed on departing tourists to help alleviate the needs of the poor.
However, his concern for the impoverished was not matched by his own lifestyle. Newspapers reported that Mokaba’s trappings of wealth clearly exceeded his income as a deputy minister. They pointed to his mansion in one of Johannesburg’s most exclusive northern suburbs, and to the luxurious imported cars that were at his disposal in Cape Town.
Mokaba shrugged off the accusations of indulgence. “I am working for the masses”, he said.
When Thabo Mbeki succeeded Mandela as president with a promise to establish an honest government, Mokaba was the first casualty. However, he remained a member of the ANC executive, and was appointed head of the party’s election campaign.
He died on Sunday of what were officially described as “acute pneumonia and respiratory problems” at his Johannesburg home, and is survived by his estranged wife, a daughter and a son.
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