Albertina Sisulu
Encyclopedia
Nontsikelelo Albertina Sisulu (21 October 1918 - 2 June 2011) was a black South Africa
n anti–apartheid activist, and the widow of fellow activist Walter Sisulu
(1912–2003). She was affectionately known as Ma Sisulu throughout her lifetime by the South African public. In 2004 she was voted 57th in the SABC3's Great South Africans
. She died on 2 June 2011 in her home in Linden, Johannesburg, South Africa, aged 92.
on October 21, 1918, she was the second of five children of Bonilizwe and Monikazi Thethiwe. Albertina's mother survived the Spanish Flu, but was constantly ill and very weak because of this. It fell upon Albertina, as the eldest girl, to take on a motherly role for her younger siblings. She had to stay out of school for long periods of time, which resulted in her being two years older than the rest of her class in her last year of primary school. She adopted the name Albertina when she started her schooling at a Presbyterian mission school in Xolobe.
Albertina started school in a local primary school in Xolobe that was run by Presbyterian missionaries and it is here that she had to choose a Christian name from a list presented to her by the missionaries. Within her extended family Albertina was the eldest of eight girls and it was her responsibility to take care of the younger girls. Even from a young age Albertina showed strong maternal instincts, and this continued throughout her life. Her leadership qualities and maternal instincts underlined the respect she earned during the struggle when she was referred to as the ‘Mother of the Nation’. Albertina excelled at school in cultural and sporting activities and she showed leadership skills at an early age when she was chosen as head girl in standard five. However, Albertina was forced to leave school on several occasions to take care of her younger siblings (because of her mother’s bad health) and this resulted in Albertina being two years older than the rest of her class in her last year of primary school. Although at the time this did not seem a major inconvenience, later when Albertina entered a competition to win a four year high school scholarship this counted against her as she was disqualified from the prize even though she had come in first place. Angered by the unfair treatment (the competition rules had set no age limit on the prize) Albertina’s teachers wrote to the local Xhosa language newspaper, Imvo Zabantsundu, making a strong case for Albertina to be given the prize. Fortunately for Albertina the article caught the attention of the priests at the local Roman Catholic Mission who then communicated with Father Bernard Huss at Mariazell. Father Huss arranged for a four year high school scholarship for Albertina at Mariazell College. The Mnyila family was very happy and celebrated Albertina's achievement with the entire village, Albertina recalls that the celebration saying “you would have thought it was a wedding”.
In 1936 Albertina left for Mariazell College in Matatiele in the Eastern Cape and although very nervous she was excited to find that a local girl from Xolobe was a prefect at Mariazell. The school's routine was rigid and strict, pupils were woken up at 4am to bath and clean their dormitories, they would then proceed to the chapel for morning prayers. Although Albertina’s scholarship covered her board and lodging, she had to pay it back during the school holidays by ploughing the fields and working in the laundry room. Albertina only went home during the December holidays but she found this a small price to pay for the opportunity to attend high school.
With high school ending in 1939 Albertina had to decide what she would do after school. She decided that she would not marry but rather become a working professional so that she could support her family back in Xolobe. Whilst at Mariazell Albertina had converted to Catholicism and because she had resolved never to marry she decided that she would become a nun as she admired the dedication of the nuns who taught at the college. However, Father Huss advised Albertina against this as nuns did not earn a salary nor did they leave the mission post, so she would not have been able to support her family in the way she wanted to. Instead he advised her to consider nursing, as trainee nurses were paid to study. Attracted by the practical solution nursing offered Albertina took his advice and applied to various nursing schools. She was accepted as a trainee nurse at a Johannesburg “Non-European” hospital called Johannesburg General. After spending Christmas with her family in Xolobe she left for Johannesburg in January 1940.
"You know what it means to be a midwife? You have got to carry a big suitcase full of bottles and for your lotions that you are going to use, and bowls and receivers, and we used to carry those suitcases on our heads," she said.
in 1941 while working at Johannesburg General Hospital; at that time he was a young political activist. They married in 1944. The Sisulus – a lawyer and a nurse – married in 1944 at a ceremony in which Nelson Mandela
was the best man. The couple had five children, Max Vuyisile, Mlungisi, Zwelakhe, Lindiwe and Nonkululeko, and adopted four others. They were married for 59 years, until he died in his wife's arms in May 2003 at the age of 90. Albertina said of her marriage: "I was told that I was marrying a politician and there was no courtship or anything like that.” Yet at his funeral their granddaughter read a tribute to him on her behalf:
Her husband, Walter Sisulu
, who died in 2003, was found guilty of high treason and sabotage, but was spared the death sentence. He instead spent 25 years in custody on Robben Island
alongside Nelson Mandela
, whom he had brought into the ANC, now South Africa′s governing party. While her husband was on Robben Island, Albertina Sisulu raised the couple′s five children alone. She spent months in jail herself and had her movements restricted.
Sisulu scraped and saved for her children to attend good schools in Swaziland outside the inferior Bantu Education System. Several of the Sisulu children have themselves become leaders in the democratic South Africa. Max Sisulu is the speaker in the National Assembly; Beryl Sisulu is South Africa′s ambassador in Norway; Lindiwe Sisulu is the minister of defence; Zwelakhe Sisulu is a prominent businessman; and daughter-in-law Elinor Sisulu, married to Max, is a well-known author and human rights activist.
In 2000, the family publicly disclosed that their adopted son, Gerald Lockman, had died of HIV/Aids.
Her life is detailed in a biography by her daughter-in-law Elinor Sisulu, Walter and Albertina Sisulu: In our lifetime.
(ANC) Women′s League in 1955, and took part in the launch of the Freedom Charter
the same year. Albertina Sisulu was the only woman present at the birth of the ANC Youth League. Albertina became a member of the executive of the Federation of South African Women in 1954. On August 9, 1956, Albertina joined Helen Joseph
and Sophia Williams-De Bruyn in a march of 20,000 women to the Union Buildings of Pretoria in protest against the apartheid government's requirement that women carry passbooks as part of the pass laws. "We said, 'nothing doing'. We are not going to carry passes." She spent three weeks in jail before being acquitted on pass charges, with Nelson Mandela as her lawyer. Sisulu opposed Bantu education, running schools from home.
Albertina was arrested after her husband skipped bail to go underground in 1963, becoming the first woman to be arrested under the General Laws Amendment Act of 1963 enacted in May. The act gave the police the power to hold suspects in detention for 90 days without charging them. Albertina was placed in solitary confinement for almost two months until August 6. She was subsequently in and out of jail for her political activities, but she continued to resist against apartheid, despite being banned for most of the 1960s. She was also a key member of the United Democratic Front
in the 1980s.
In 1986 she received the honourary citizenship of Reggio nell′Emilia
(Italy), the first world's town that assigned this important award to Albertina Sisulu.
In 1989 she managed to obtain a passport and led a UDF delegation overseas, meeting British prime minister Margaret Thatcher
and United States president George HW Bush. In London, she addressed a major anti-apartheid rally to protest against the visit of National Party
leader FW de Klerk. In 1994, she was elected to the first democratic Parliament, which she served until retiring four years later. That year she received an award from then-president Mandela.
The Albertina Sisulu Multipurpose Resource Centre/ASC, named after Albertina Sisulu, was also founded by Albertina. It was founded under the auspices of the Albertina Sisulu Foundation, which is a non-profit organization that was established by the Sisulu Family. Weeks later, she and Mandela opened the Walter Sisulu Paediatric Cardiac Centre for Africa in Johannesburg, named for her late husband. She became a trustee for the centre and helped fundraise for it.
Albertina and her family were residents of Orlando West, Soweto
, South Africa, when it was established. Mrs. Sisulu has witnessed firsthand the development of the community where the Sisulu family lived, sorely lacking in social services and despite enormous obstacles, has committed herself to alleviating the hardships of the community. The Albertina Sisulu Multipurpose Resource Centre/ASC provides the following services:
, established to help South Africans confront and forgive their brutal history. Albertina Sisulu testified before the commission about the Mandela United Football Club, a gang linked to Mandela's then-wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela
, accused of terrorizing Soweto
in the 1980s. She was accused of trying to protect Madikizela-Mandela during the hearings, but her testimony was stark. She said she believed the Mandela United Football Club burned down her house because she pulled some of her young relatives out of the gang. She also testified about hearing the shot that killed her colleague, a Soweto doctor whose murder has been linked to the group. Albertina Sisulu, a nurse at the doctor's clinic, said they had a "mother and son" relationship.
, the urban area southwest of Johannesburg
constructed for the settlement of black people.
President Jacob Zuma
paid tribute to Ma Sisulu in the wake of her passing. "Mama Sisulu has, over the decades, been a pillar of strength not only for the Sisulu family but also the entire liberation movement, as she reared, counselled, nursed and educated most of the leaders and founders of the democratic SA", Zuma said. He also announced that Sisulu would receive a state funeral
, and that national flags would be flown half-mast from June 4 until the day of her burial.
Member - Federation of South African Women, South Africa
Sector: Community (1954–2011)
Treasurer - Women's League, African National Congress, South Africa
Sector: Government & Public Administration (1959–1990)
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
n anti–apartheid activist, and the widow of fellow activist Walter Sisulu
Walter Sisulu
Walter Max Ulyate Sisulu was a South African anti-apartheid activist and member of the African National Congress .-Family and Education:...
(1912–2003). She was affectionately known as Ma Sisulu throughout her lifetime by the South African public. In 2004 she was voted 57th in the SABC3's Great South Africans
SABC3's Great South Africans
Great South Africans was a South African television series that aired on SABC3 and hosted by Noeleen Maholwana Sangqu and Denis Beckett. In September 2004, thousands of South Africans took part in an informal nationwide poll to determine the "100 Greatest South Africans" of all time...
. She died on 2 June 2011 in her home in Linden, Johannesburg, South Africa, aged 92.
Early life
Born Nontsikelelo Albertina Thethiwe in the Tsomo district of the TranskeiTranskei
The Transkei , officially the Republic of Transkei , was a Bantustan—an area set aside for members of a specific ethnicity—and nominal parliamentary democracy in the southeastern region of South Africa...
on October 21, 1918, she was the second of five children of Bonilizwe and Monikazi Thethiwe. Albertina's mother survived the Spanish Flu, but was constantly ill and very weak because of this. It fell upon Albertina, as the eldest girl, to take on a motherly role for her younger siblings. She had to stay out of school for long periods of time, which resulted in her being two years older than the rest of her class in her last year of primary school. She adopted the name Albertina when she started her schooling at a Presbyterian mission school in Xolobe.
Albertina started school in a local primary school in Xolobe that was run by Presbyterian missionaries and it is here that she had to choose a Christian name from a list presented to her by the missionaries. Within her extended family Albertina was the eldest of eight girls and it was her responsibility to take care of the younger girls. Even from a young age Albertina showed strong maternal instincts, and this continued throughout her life. Her leadership qualities and maternal instincts underlined the respect she earned during the struggle when she was referred to as the ‘Mother of the Nation’. Albertina excelled at school in cultural and sporting activities and she showed leadership skills at an early age when she was chosen as head girl in standard five. However, Albertina was forced to leave school on several occasions to take care of her younger siblings (because of her mother’s bad health) and this resulted in Albertina being two years older than the rest of her class in her last year of primary school. Although at the time this did not seem a major inconvenience, later when Albertina entered a competition to win a four year high school scholarship this counted against her as she was disqualified from the prize even though she had come in first place. Angered by the unfair treatment (the competition rules had set no age limit on the prize) Albertina’s teachers wrote to the local Xhosa language newspaper, Imvo Zabantsundu, making a strong case for Albertina to be given the prize. Fortunately for Albertina the article caught the attention of the priests at the local Roman Catholic Mission who then communicated with Father Bernard Huss at Mariazell. Father Huss arranged for a four year high school scholarship for Albertina at Mariazell College. The Mnyila family was very happy and celebrated Albertina's achievement with the entire village, Albertina recalls that the celebration saying “you would have thought it was a wedding”.
In 1936 Albertina left for Mariazell College in Matatiele in the Eastern Cape and although very nervous she was excited to find that a local girl from Xolobe was a prefect at Mariazell. The school's routine was rigid and strict, pupils were woken up at 4am to bath and clean their dormitories, they would then proceed to the chapel for morning prayers. Although Albertina’s scholarship covered her board and lodging, she had to pay it back during the school holidays by ploughing the fields and working in the laundry room. Albertina only went home during the December holidays but she found this a small price to pay for the opportunity to attend high school.
With high school ending in 1939 Albertina had to decide what she would do after school. She decided that she would not marry but rather become a working professional so that she could support her family back in Xolobe. Whilst at Mariazell Albertina had converted to Catholicism and because she had resolved never to marry she decided that she would become a nun as she admired the dedication of the nuns who taught at the college. However, Father Huss advised Albertina against this as nuns did not earn a salary nor did they leave the mission post, so she would not have been able to support her family in the way she wanted to. Instead he advised her to consider nursing, as trainee nurses were paid to study. Attracted by the practical solution nursing offered Albertina took his advice and applied to various nursing schools. She was accepted as a trainee nurse at a Johannesburg “Non-European” hospital called Johannesburg General. After spending Christmas with her family in Xolobe she left for Johannesburg in January 1940.
Education
After being orphaned as a teenager, she was obliged to help provide for her younger brothers and sisters. Abandoning her ambition to train as a teacher, she left the Transkei to train as a nurse at Johannesburg′s Non-European Hospital in 1940, as nurses were paid during training. She graduated from Mariazell College in 1939, and chose a career in nursing. Sisulu started work in Johannesburg as a midwife in 1946, often walking to visit patients in townships."You know what it means to be a midwife? You have got to carry a big suitcase full of bottles and for your lotions that you are going to use, and bowls and receivers, and we used to carry those suitcases on our heads," she said.
Personal life
Albertina first met Walter SisuluWalter Sisulu
Walter Max Ulyate Sisulu was a South African anti-apartheid activist and member of the African National Congress .-Family and Education:...
in 1941 while working at Johannesburg General Hospital; at that time he was a young political activist. They married in 1944. The Sisulus – a lawyer and a nurse – married in 1944 at a ceremony in which Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, and was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist, and the leader of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing...
was the best man. The couple had five children, Max Vuyisile, Mlungisi, Zwelakhe, Lindiwe and Nonkululeko, and adopted four others. They were married for 59 years, until he died in his wife's arms in May 2003 at the age of 90. Albertina said of her marriage: "I was told that I was marrying a politician and there was no courtship or anything like that.” Yet at his funeral their granddaughter read a tribute to him on her behalf:
- "Walter, what do I do without you? It was for you who I woke up in the morning, it was for you who I lived ... You were taken away by the evils of the past the first time, but I knew you would come back to me. Now the cold hand of death has taken you and left a void in my heart."
Her husband, Walter Sisulu
Walter Sisulu
Walter Max Ulyate Sisulu was a South African anti-apartheid activist and member of the African National Congress .-Family and Education:...
, who died in 2003, was found guilty of high treason and sabotage, but was spared the death sentence. He instead spent 25 years in custody on Robben Island
Robben Island
Robben Island is an island in Table Bay, 6.9 km west of the coast of Bloubergstrand, Cape Town, South Africa. The name is Dutch for "seal island". Robben Island is roughly oval in shape, 3.3 km long north-south, and 1.9 km wide, with an area of 5.07 km². It is flat and only a...
alongside Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, and was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist, and the leader of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing...
, whom he had brought into the ANC, now South Africa′s governing party. While her husband was on Robben Island, Albertina Sisulu raised the couple′s five children alone. She spent months in jail herself and had her movements restricted.
Sisulu scraped and saved for her children to attend good schools in Swaziland outside the inferior Bantu Education System. Several of the Sisulu children have themselves become leaders in the democratic South Africa. Max Sisulu is the speaker in the National Assembly; Beryl Sisulu is South Africa′s ambassador in Norway; Lindiwe Sisulu is the minister of defence; Zwelakhe Sisulu is a prominent businessman; and daughter-in-law Elinor Sisulu, married to Max, is a well-known author and human rights activist.
In 2000, the family publicly disclosed that their adopted son, Gerald Lockman, had died of HIV/Aids.
Her life is detailed in a biography by her daughter-in-law Elinor Sisulu, Walter and Albertina Sisulu: In our lifetime.
Political career
Albertina did not display an interest in politics at first, only attending political meetings with Walter in a supporting capacity, but she eventually got involved in politics when she joined the African National CongressAfrican National Congress
The African National Congress is South Africa's governing Africanist political party, supported by its tripartite alliance with the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the South African Communist Party , since the establishment of non-racial democracy in April 1994. It defines itself as a...
(ANC) Women′s League in 1955, and took part in the launch of the Freedom Charter
Freedom Charter
The Freedom Charter was the statement of core principles of the South African Congress Alliance, which consisted of the African National Congress and its allies - the South African Indian Congress, the South African Congress of Democrats and the Coloured People's Congress...
the same year. Albertina Sisulu was the only woman present at the birth of the ANC Youth League. Albertina became a member of the executive of the Federation of South African Women in 1954. On August 9, 1956, Albertina joined Helen Joseph
Helen Joseph
Helen Joseph , a South African anti-apartheid activist, was born in Easebourne near Midhurst West Sussex, England and graduated from King's College London, in 1927. After working as a teacher in India for three years, Helen came to South Africa in 1931, where she met and married Billie Joseph...
and Sophia Williams-De Bruyn in a march of 20,000 women to the Union Buildings of Pretoria in protest against the apartheid government's requirement that women carry passbooks as part of the pass laws. "We said, 'nothing doing'. We are not going to carry passes." She spent three weeks in jail before being acquitted on pass charges, with Nelson Mandela as her lawyer. Sisulu opposed Bantu education, running schools from home.
Albertina was arrested after her husband skipped bail to go underground in 1963, becoming the first woman to be arrested under the General Laws Amendment Act of 1963 enacted in May. The act gave the police the power to hold suspects in detention for 90 days without charging them. Albertina was placed in solitary confinement for almost two months until August 6. She was subsequently in and out of jail for her political activities, but she continued to resist against apartheid, despite being banned for most of the 1960s. She was also a key member of the United Democratic Front
United Democratic Front
*United Democratic Front *United Democratic Front *United Democratic Front , a political party in Malawi, which won the 2005 general election.*United Democratic Front *United Democratic Front...
in the 1980s.
In 1986 she received the honourary citizenship of Reggio nell′Emilia
Reggio Emilia
Reggio Emilia is an affluent city in northern Italy, in the Emilia-Romagna region. It has about 170,000 inhabitants and is the main comune of the Province of Reggio Emilia....
(Italy), the first world's town that assigned this important award to Albertina Sisulu.
In 1989 she managed to obtain a passport and led a UDF delegation overseas, meeting British prime minister Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
and United States president George HW Bush. In London, she addressed a major anti-apartheid rally to protest against the visit of National Party
National Party
-Active parties:-Former parties:...
leader FW de Klerk. In 1994, she was elected to the first democratic Parliament, which she served until retiring four years later. That year she received an award from then-president Mandela.
Community Work
For more than 50 years, Albertina committed herself to The Albertina Sisulu Foundation, which works to improve the lives of small children and old people. She was honoured for her commitment to the anti-apartheid struggle and her social work when the World Peace Council, based in Basel, Switzerland, elected her president from 1993 to 1996. She recruited nurses to go to Tanzania, to replace British nurses who left after Tanzanian independence. The South African nurses had to be "smuggled" out of SA into Botswana and from there they flew to Tanzania.The Albertina Sisulu Multipurpose Resource Centre/ASC, named after Albertina Sisulu, was also founded by Albertina. It was founded under the auspices of the Albertina Sisulu Foundation, which is a non-profit organization that was established by the Sisulu Family. Weeks later, she and Mandela opened the Walter Sisulu Paediatric Cardiac Centre for Africa in Johannesburg, named for her late husband. She became a trustee for the centre and helped fundraise for it.
Albertina and her family were residents of Orlando West, Soweto
Soweto
Soweto is a lower-class-populated urban area of the city of Johannesburg in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships...
, South Africa, when it was established. Mrs. Sisulu has witnessed firsthand the development of the community where the Sisulu family lived, sorely lacking in social services and despite enormous obstacles, has committed herself to alleviating the hardships of the community. The Albertina Sisulu Multipurpose Resource Centre/ASC provides the following services:
- A school for children with special needs –severe/moderate intellectual challenge – resource school
- An Early Childhood Development Centre for learners from the age of three years
- A section for the out of school youth with disabilities established with an intention to provide them with skills which would render them employable and active participants in the country‘s economy
- A nutrition programme for the needy earners
- A multi-purpose community hall
- An outreach program
Controversy
In 1997, she was called before the Truth and Reconciliation CommissionTruth and Reconciliation Commission
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was a court-like restorative justice body assembled in South Africa after the abolition of apartheid. Witnesses who were identified as victims of gross human rights violations were invited to give statements about their experiences, and some were selected...
, established to help South Africans confront and forgive their brutal history. Albertina Sisulu testified before the commission about the Mandela United Football Club, a gang linked to Mandela's then-wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela is a South African politician who has held several government positions and headed the African National Congress Women's League. She is currently a member of the ANC's National Executive Committee...
, accused of terrorizing Soweto
Soweto
Soweto is a lower-class-populated urban area of the city of Johannesburg in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships...
in the 1980s. She was accused of trying to protect Madikizela-Mandela during the hearings, but her testimony was stark. She said she believed the Mandela United Football Club burned down her house because she pulled some of her young relatives out of the gang. She also testified about hearing the shot that killed her colleague, a Soweto doctor whose murder has been linked to the group. Albertina Sisulu, a nurse at the doctor's clinic, said they had a "mother and son" relationship.
Quotation
Sisulu said the following in 1987, referring to SowetoSoweto
Soweto is a lower-class-populated urban area of the city of Johannesburg in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships...
, the urban area southwest of Johannesburg
Johannesburg
Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...
constructed for the settlement of black people.
- "Women are the people who are going to relieve us from all this oppression and depression. The rent boycottBoycottA boycott is an act of voluntarily abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with a person, organization, or country as an expression of protest, usually for political reasons...
that is happening in SowetoSowetoSoweto is a lower-class-populated urban area of the city of Johannesburg in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships...
now is alive because of the women. It is the women who are on the street committees educating the people to stand up and protect each other."
Death
Albertina died suddenly in her home in Linden, Johannesburg at age 92 on 2 June 2011 at around 20h00 in the evening while watching television with her grandchildren. According to news reports, she suddenly fell ill, coughing blood, and paramedics who rushed to the scene were unable to revive her. At the time of her death, Albertina was survived by five children, Max, Mlungisi, Zwelakhe, Lindiwe and Nonkululeko, her adopted niece and nephew, Gerald and Beryl, and 26 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. Her family expressed their sorrow at her death, but said that it comforted them to know that she and her beloved husband of 59 years were no doubt together again.President Jacob Zuma
Jacob Zuma
Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma is the President of South Africa, elected by parliament following his party's victory in the 2009 general election....
paid tribute to Ma Sisulu in the wake of her passing. "Mama Sisulu has, over the decades, been a pillar of strength not only for the Sisulu family but also the entire liberation movement, as she reared, counselled, nursed and educated most of the leaders and founders of the democratic SA", Zuma said. He also announced that Sisulu would receive a state funeral
State funeral
A state funeral is a public funeral ceremony, observing the strict rules of protocol, held to honor heads of state or other important people of national significance. State funerals usually include much pomp and ceremony as well as religious overtones and distinctive elements of military tradition...
, and that national flags would be flown half-mast from June 4 until the day of her burial.
Positions Held
She became national co-president of the liberal United Democratic Front at its inception in 1983. Later she joined the ANC Women's League and was elected deputy president, and in 1994 she became a member of Parliament before retiring in 1998.Member - Federation of South African Women, South Africa
Sector: Community (1954–2011)
Treasurer - Women's League, African National Congress, South Africa
Sector: Government & Public Administration (1959–1990)
External links
- http://www.uj.ac.za/index.asp?page=article&code=7&id=996 Liberation leaders honoured for their contributions to democracy (12 April 2007)
- http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/albertina-sisulu-south-african-history-online-3 Albertina Sisulu