Aziz Pahad, a leader in the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, passed away, according to both his family and the country’s ruling African National Congress Party (ANC). He was 82.
At his Johannesburg home on Wednesday night, Pahad passed away. In July, his brother Essop Pahad passed away. Essop was a veteran of the war against white minority rule.
The ANC declared that it would always remember Pahad as a patriot, freedom fighter, and servant of the people.
Below are facts about him:
1. He was born on December 25, 1940.
2. Aziz Pahad was Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1994 to 2008. He was a member of the National Executive Committee of the African National Congress from 1985 to 2007.
3. His parents, Amina and Goolam Pahad, were Transvaal Indian Congress workers, and his older brother, Essop, followed in their footsteps.
4. He graduated from the Central Indian High School in Johannesburg in 1959, and he went on to get his bachelor’s degree there in 1963, majoring in sociology and Afrikaans.
5. Aziz Pahad was issued a banning order in 1963 for his involvement in the anti-apartheid struggle while still a student, primarily through the Transvaal Indian Congress. His movements and public actions were restricted by the order, and he was frequently taken into custody. He and Essop departed South Africa and went into exile in 1964 following the historic Rivonia Trial.
6. Pahad lived in exile for a while, principally in London, England, but also briefly in Angola and Zimbabwe. In 1966, he earned a diploma from University College London, and in 1968, he graduated from the University of Sussex with a master’s in international relations.
7. Pahad began working full-time for the African National Congress (ANC), which was in exile, in 1966. He assisted in the growth of the anti-apartheid movement in the UK and Europe. He was initially elected to the party’s National Executive Committee at the ANC’s 1985 election conference in Kabwe, Zambia.
8. Pahad visited South Africa again in 1990 as the talks to end apartheid were taking place. He was chosen to fill in for Alfred Nzo as the ANC’s Department of International Affairs’ deputy director the following year.
9. During the discussions, he served on the National Peace Executive Committee, and in 1994, during the post-apartheid transition, he was a member of the Transitional Executive Council’s international affairs subcommittee.
10. Aziz Pahad won the ANC’s nomination to serve as the party’s representative in the new National Assembly in South Africa’s first post-apartheid elections in 1994. Additionally, he was added to the Government of National Unity as the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs by newly elected President Nelson Mandela. Pahad handled a large portion of the Ministry’s public profile during his first tenure in office, again filling in for Alfred Nzo.