Ephraim Phumuga Mogale (6 February 1959 – 2003) was a South African politician and former

anti-apartheid activist Several independent sectors of South African society opposed apartheid through various means, including social movements, passive resistance, and guerrilla warfare. Mass action against the ruling National Party (NP) government, coupled with So ...

. The inaugural president of the

Congress of South African Students The Congress of South African Students (COSAS) is an anti-apartheid student organisation established in 1979 in the wake of the June 16 Soweto Uprisings in 1976 in South Africa. Background COSAS was formed in June 1979 after the South African Stu ...

(COSAS), he was an underground operative for

Umkhonto we Sizwe uMkhonto weSizwe (; abbreviated MK; ) was the paramilitary wing of the African National Congress (ANC), founded by Nelson Mandela in the wake of the Sharpeville massacre. Its mission was to fight against the South African government to brin ...

(MK) in the Northern Transvaal and was imprisoned on

Robben Island Robben Island () is an island in Table Bay, 6.9 kilometres (4.3 mi) west of the coast of Bloubergstrand, north of Cape Town, South Africa. It takes its name from the Dutch language, Dutch word for seals (''robben''), hence the Dutch/Afrika ...

from 1980 to 1985. After the end of apartheid, he represented the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a political party in South Africa. It originated as a liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid and has governed the country since 1994, when the 1994 South African general election, fir ...

(ANC) in the

National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repr ...

and

Mpumalanga Provincial Legislature The Mpumalanga Provincial Legislature (MPL), previously known as the Eastern Transvaal Legislature, is the primary legislative body of the South African province of Mpumalanga. The First Legislature was inaugurated in May 1994 as the Eastern Tr ...

Early life and activism

Mogale, a Pedi speaker, was born on 6 February 1959. In the 1970s, he joined the outlawed ANC and, after receiving training, returned to his hometown of Moutse in the former Northern Transvaal, where he and other members of the ANC underground sought to promote the anti-apartheid youth movement by organising youth clubs and political education forums, producing pamphlets, and recruiting youths for training at MK camps abroad. In 1979, Mogale was elected as COSAS's inaugural president. In November of that year, he and other leading members of COSAS were detained under the Terrorism Act. In late April 1980, he and another student,

Thabo Makunyane Thabo Lucas Makunyane (25 October 1953 – 11 June 2020) was a South African politician and former anti-apartheid activist. He was the first mayor of Limpopo's Polokwane Local Municipality from 2000 to 2010. He also served in the National Asse ...

, were charged with furthering the aims of the ANC. Mogale was convicted and spent five years on Robben Island. Upon his release in October 1985, Mogale resumed his anti-apartheid activism. Between 1986 and 1990, he was an underground MK operative in the Transvaal, primarily involved in smuggling weapons into the country and distributing them to activists by means of

dead letter boxes A dead drop or dead letter box is a method of espionage tradecraft used to pass items or information between two individuals (e.g., a case officer and an agent, or two agents) via a secret location. By avoiding direct meetings, individuals can ...

Legislative career

In the 1999 general election, Mogale stood for the ANC as a candidate for election to the National Assembly. He narrowly missed election but was sworn in shortly after the election, on 14 June 1999; he replaced

Thabo Mbeki Thabo Mvuyelwa Mbeki (; born 18 June 1942) is a South African politician who served as the 2nd democratic president of South Africa from 14 June 1999 to 24 September 2008, when he resigned at the request of his party, the African National Cong ...

, who by law ceded his seat once the assembly elected him as

President of South Africa The president of South Africa is the head of state and head of government of the Republic of South Africa. The president directs the executive branch of the government and is the commander-in-chief of the South African National Defence F ...

. Mogale served in the seat for just over a year, resigning on 2 July 2001; he was replaced by Louisa Mabe. Mogale, in turn, filled a casual vacancy in the

Death

He died in a car accident in 2003. He is the namesake of the Ephraim Mogale Local Municipality in

Limpopo Limpopo () is the northernmost Provinces of South Africa, province of South Africa. It is named after the Limpopo River, which forms the province's western and northern borders. The term Limpopo is derived from Rivombo (Livombo/Lebombo), a ...

(the former Northern Transvaal).

References

External links

Testimony
to the

Truth and Reconciliation Commission A truth commission, also known as a truth and reconciliation commission or truth and justice commission, is an official body tasked with discovering and revealing past wrongdoing by a government (or, depending on the circumstances, non-state ac ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mogale, Ephraim African National Congress politicians Members of the National Assembly of South Africa 1999–2004 South African anti-apartheid activists UMkhonto we Sizwe personnel Inmates of Robben Island Members of the Mpumalanga Provincial Legislature 1959 births 2003 deaths