Thenjiwe Mtintso (7 November 1950) is a South African anti-apartheid activist, politician and ambassador who has held senior positions within the African National Congress (ANC), the

South African Communist Party The South African Communist Party (SACP) is a communist party in South Africa. It was founded in 1921 as the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), tactically dissolved itself in 1950 in the face of being declared illegal by the governing Na ...

(SACP), and is a veteran of uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK).

Life

Thenjiwe was born and raised in

Soweto, Johannesburg Soweto () is a township of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for ''South Western Townships''. Formerly a se ...

. She is daughter to Hanna " MaRadebe" Mtintso and Gana Makabeni, who also served as a trade unionist and member of the African National Congress (ANC). Thenjiwe became a student activist in the South African Student Organisation (SASO) and Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) during her studies at the

University of Fort Hare The University of Fort Hare is a public university in Alice, Eastern Cape, South Africa. It was a key institution of higher education for Africans from 1916 to 1959 when it offered a Western-style academic education to students from across sub ...

. One of Thenjiwe’s most notable encounters with the Apartheid law, was when she was arrested in October 1976. While still in detention, she was charged with a 5-year ban in December 1976. Following 282 days in jail, she and Joyce Mokhesi were released. In 1978, when

Steve Biko Bantu Stephen Biko (18 December 1946 – 12 September 1977) was a South African anti-apartheid activist. Ideologically an African nationalist and African socialist, he was at the forefront of a grassroots anti-apartheid campaign known ...

, an activist with whom she had worked with, was murdered by the police while being held in custody, she went into exile. In the wake of Biko's death, she moved to

Lesotho Lesotho ( ), officially the Kingdom of Lesotho, is a country landlocked country, landlocked as an Enclave and exclave, enclave in South Africa. It is situated in the Maloti Mountains and contains the Thabana Ntlenyana, highest mountains in Sou ...

to join Umkhonto we Sizwe (Zulu and Xhosa: "Spear of the Nation"), the armed wing of the ANC, and the SACP. She was elected to Parliament following South Africa's first multiracial elections in 1994, she was Chair of th
Commission of Gender Equality
in 1997. Since 2007, she has served as South Africa's ambassador to Cuba, Italy, Romania, Malawi and Spain.

References

1950 births African National Congress politicians South African Communist Party politicians Living people {{SouthAfrica-politician-stub