Sydney Mufamadi - Anti-apartheid Work

Anti-apartheid Work

In 1976, with the spread of the Soweto uprising into other areas of the country, Mufamadi became a member of Zoutpansberg Students Organisation, which led to the boycotts in Venda during October 1977. Many student leaders were arrested, and others, including Mufamadi, went underground. When the schools re-opened, he was refused re-admission and was briefly prevented from completing his schooling. He moved to Johannesburg and enrolled at an international Correspondence College.

In 1977, he joined the African National Congress, the next year he was a founder member of the Azanian People's Organisation and in 1981 he joined the South African Communist Party. His involvement in AZAPO led to two month's detention without trial at John Vorster Square, Johannesburg, under section 6 of the Terrorism Act.

In 1980, Mufamadi worked as a private teacher at Lamula Secondary School, Soweto, where he assisted members of the Congress of South African Students with political activities. In 1981, he left the teaching profession to work as a messenger for a firm of attorneys and subsequently joined the General and Allied Workers Union and participated in the 16 June stay-away that year. After his employer saw a newspaper clipping of Mufamadi addressing the workers, he was fired for taking part in political activities. He worked voluntarily for GAWU, and in 1982 and 1984 was elected General Secretary of the organisation. In 1983, he attended the launch of the United Democratic Front in Cape Town, and was later elected Transvaal publicity secretary of the organisation, a position he held until 1990. In 1984 he was detained twice in the Ciskei during April and again in September.

Following the successful Transvaal regional stayaway in November 1984, Mufamadi was subpoenaed to appear as a state witness at the trial of some of its organisers. However, when some of the accused fled the country, charges were withdrawn and he was not called to testify. In 1985, when the state of emergency was declared, Mufamadi operated underground to avoid detention, resurfacing to help organise and attend the December 1985 launch of the Congress of South African Trade Unions in Durban, where he was elected Assistant General Secretary at its inaugural rally. He operated underground from June 1986 to October 1986, but openly resumed his work despite the continuing state of emergency. He was again detained on 8 June 1987 for political activities.

In June 1988, Mufamadi headed a planning committee to organise an anti-apartheid conference in Cape Town, which aimed to include delegates from a broad spectrum of anti-apartheid organisations. In September 1988, the government prohibited the conference and restricted the organisers of the conference from entering Cape Town for a ten-day period. In January 1990, he travelled with the Rivonia Trialists to Lusaka, Zambia, to meet with the ANC Executive Committee. In 1991, he was elected to the party’s central committee, and was elected to the party’s National Executive Committee and to serve on its working committee at an ANC congress held in Durban in July later that year. He did not stand for re-election as COSATU Assistant General Secretary that year. He was an SACP delegate at the Convention for a Democratic South Africa working group, which dealt with the future of the independent Bantustans, or homelands.