Anton Muziwakhe Lembede

ANC Youth League's founding president, 1914-1947

Youth League's founding president reburied

The remains of the ANC Youth League's founding president, Anton Muziwakhe Lembede, were exhumed in Johannesburg this week, and was to be reburied at his hometown in Mbumbulu on 27 October.

Elected president at the founding of the Youth League in 1944, and widely-regard as a daring thinker and articulate leader, Lembede died suddenly in 1947 at the age of 33.

Writing at the time in the newspaper 'Inkundla ya Bantu', Govan Mbeki described Lembede's death as a grievous national loss "in which the African public has lost one of its most zealous and determined sons who dedicated his short span of life to the cause of his people".

"In his selfless struggle for the national cause he has built himself a monument in the hearts of his people," Mbeki wrote.

Speaking at the exhumation ceremony, ANC Secretary General Kgalema Motlanthe said Lembede belonged to a generation of the youth which infused a new militancy into the spirit of African nationalism. This was a generation that was always prepared to engage the leadership of the ANC to ensure the ANC could indeed fulfil its historic mission. Lembede understood and asserted the need for Africans to be their own liberators.

"This vision had a profound impact on the shaping of the thoughts of this generation of freedom fighters, which was to transform the ANC into a mass-based organisation ready to struggle for the liberation of our people," Motlanthe said.

Born in the rural district of Georgedale near Durban in 1914, Anton Muziwake Lembede was of peasant origin. He went to Adam's College on a bursary in 1933 to train as a teacher. He matriculated in 1937 with a distinction in Latin. He taught in Natal and the Orange Free State at the age of 29 and at the same time learned Sesotho and Afrikaans.

In 1943 he obtained a BA degree through correspondence with the University of South Africa and, again through self-education, he obtained an LLB degree. Pixley ka Isaka Seme agreed to article Lembede as a law clerk. In 1946 he became a full partner in 'Seme and Lembede'. He later achieved an MA degree in Philosophy.

Lembede was militantly nationalistic, with very strong views on the Africanness of the struggle. Many of his views are captured in 1944 Manifesto of the ANC Youth League. The Manifesto said "Africans must struggle for development, progress and national liberation". It called on African youth to be united, consolidated, trained and disciplined because from their ranks future leaders would be recruited.

The African National Congress was described by the ANC Youth League as 'the symbol and embodiment of the African's will to present a united national front against all forms of oppression' - but it was admitted that Congress had not been able to make progress and this had drawn to it criticism 'in the last 20 years'. The Youth League presented a positive strategy which took a form of a programme, a goal and clarifying ideological questions in the process.

Lembede was involved in efforts in 1947 to build a partnership with the Natal Indian Congress, Transvaal Indian Congress and the coloured African People's Organisation, which was an important element of the ANC's non-racial tradition.

Anton Lembede made an indelible mark on the history of the ANC, the role of the youth and the direction of the struggle.

MORE INFORMATION:

Speech by ANC Secretary General, 21 October 2002

From: ANC Today, Vol.2, No.43, 25 October 2002