Baleka Mbete

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Baleka Mbete (2016)

Baleka Mmakota Mbete (born September 24, 1949 in Clermont ; Durban ), also known as Baleka Mbete-Kgositsile , is a former South African politician of the African National Congress (ANC). She was speaker (president) of the National Assembly from 2014 to 2019 . Previously, she was Vice President of South Africa. From 2007 to 2017 she was National Chairperson of the ANC.

Life

Baleka Mbete was the second of eight children of the married couple Mary and Theophilus Mbete. Her mother worked as a kindergarten teacher and her father as an employee of the Bantu authorities .

Mbete grew up in preschool with her grandmother in the north of the Transvaal and graduated from elementary school in Durban. In 1958 she moved with her family to Alice , where her father had received a position as a librarian at the University College of Fort Hare . After her father, a member of the South African Communist Party , lost his job due to the prohibition of political activities in universities, she was sent to a school in Butterworth . She was later sent to boarding school near Durban. In 1973 she took her matric at Inanda Seminary . She then worked in various positions for three years, during which time she looked for further training. She now enrolled at Eshowe Training College but was expelled from the facility after a few months due to conflicts with the school administration. She turned to Lovedale Teacher Training College , where she completed a teacher training course in 1973 on schedule. She then taught at Isibonelo High School in the KwaMashu - Township of Durban.

During her time in Durban, Mbete was involved in the KwaMashu Youth Organization (KYO), a partner organization of the Natal Youth Organization (NYO); in the network of the Black Consciousness Movement and sought contact with the African National Congress (ANC). In her free time she organized socio-political discussion groups with interested students. That caught the attention of the South African security police, who arrested her brother and another NYO member. She was also detained for a few days. Based on this experience, she decided to quit teaching and started a secretarial training course. She received a message from her imprisoned brother from the prison in John Vorster Square in Johannesburg urging her to leave the country. On April 10, 1976, with the support of ANC underground structures, she fled across the border into Swaziland . Here she first worked for the ANC, then again as a teacher in Mbabane . In July 1977, Baleka Mbete traveled to Tanzania , where she took a job at Radio Freedom and also worked in the ANC's Information and Publicity department. As a result of the exodus of many South Africans during the riots of 1976, the ANC created a regional group of the African National Congress Women's League here in 1978 , for which she was elected first secretary .

In 1978 she married the exile writer Keorapetse Kgositsile . With him she went to Nairobi in 1981 , where he taught at the University of Nairobi . Because of her involvement in the attempted coup against Daniel arap Moi , Mbete fled to Botswana , resumed her work for the ANC and became director of the Medu Gaborone Arts Ensemble . After the attack by South African forces on Gaborone in 1985, she had to flee again; The couple stayed in Zimbabwe with their five children and worked at the regional headquarters of the ANC before moving to the ANC headquarters in Lusaka at the beginning of 1987 , where they also became involved in central projects in the ANC Women's League .

Baleka Mbete (left) during a state visit by Vladimir Putin to South Africa in 2006

On June 8, 1990 Mbete returned to South Africa and was elected the first general secretary of the women's organization. From 1994 to 1996 she was the spokesperson for the ANC and subsequently deputy president of the National Assembly . From 2004 she was President (Speaker) of Parliament for the first time . In 2008/2009 she was the country's vice-president in the Motlanthe cabinet . She had been considered a favorite for the post of president, but Jacob Zuma had suggested Kgalema Motlanthe . In 2009 she was elected National Chairperson of the ANC, and in 2014 she was again President of the National Assembly; In 2017 she lost the position of National Chairperson to Gwede Mantashe . In 2019, she was replaced as President of Parliament by Thandi Modise . She then returned her parliamentary mandate, which had been defended in 2019.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Shelagh Gastrow: Who's Who in South African Politics Number 4 . Ravan Press, Johannesburg 1992, 1st ed. Pp. 112-114.
  2. ↑ Isibonelo Secondary School: About Us . on www.isibonelosecondary.co.za (English)
  3. ↑ Baleka Mbete ( memento of November 2, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) in Who's Who Southern Africa (English).
  4. ↑ Article Zuma's Cabinet: Those who didn't make the cut . In: Mail & Guardian Online of May 10, 2009, accessed on November 12, 2011.
  5. ^ Baleka Mbete and Malusi Gigaba decline parliamentary seats. timeslive.co.za on May 21, 2019, accessed on May 22, 2019.
personal data
SURNAME Mbete, Baleka
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Baleka Mmakota Mbete-Kgositsile
BRIEF DESCRIPTION South African politician and former Vice President of South Africa
DATE OF BIRTH September 24, 1949
PLACE OF BIRTH Clermont