The Ahmed Kathrada Foundation has announced the passing of Ebrahim Ismail Ebrahim, a leader of the anti-apartheid struggle, on Monday.
He was 84 years old.
The foundation describes Ebrahim’s life as “one of courage, characterized by a spirit of sacrifice.”
According to his government biography, Ebrahim joined the liberation movement as a youth activist in 1952 and participated in the Congress of the People Campaign that drafted and adopted the Freedom Charter in 1955.
He participated in all the campaigns of the 1950s, and after the banning of the ANC in 1960, he joined Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the ANC.
In 1963, he was arrested and charged under the sabotage act, along with 18 others in the Pietermaritzburg sabotage trial. He was sentenced to 15 years on Robben Island.
Upon his release in 1979, he was banned and restricted to his home town in Durban. He was not allowed to engage in any public or political activities. On the instructions of the ANC, he went into exile in 1980. He operated from frontline states bordering SA and was responsible for the underground political network.
He was kidnapped by SA security forces from Swaziland in December 1986 and detained in South Africa, where he was tortured severely. He was convicted of high treason and sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment in Robben Island.
In 1991, the appeal court ruled his kidnapping from a foreign country was illegal, and that the SA court had no jurisdiction to try him. He was released from prison in early 1991.
He was elected to the national executive committee of the ANC in July 1991 and to the national working committee as well.
He participated in the negotiations leading to the establishment of a democratic government in South Africa post-apartheid.
Ebrahim was elected a member of parliament in 1994 and later served as deputy minister of international relations and cooperation.