Steve, Believe it or not, I was trying to empty my draw when I came upon your card and said to myself, I have to sent him an E-mail and surprise him, if he is still alive. I say alive, ’cause we are all coming to the end of our journey. What seemed so far [...]

Kader Asmal was a man who achieved much in life and, gave back to his country. An activist, professor of human rights at the University of the Western Cape, chairman of the council of the University of the North and vice-president of the African Association of International Law.  He was an Honorary Fellow of the [...]

Nontsikelelo Albertina Sisulu (21 October 1918 – 2 June 2011) was a black, female, South African anti-apartheid activist, and the widow of fellow activist Walter Sisulu (1912–2003). She was affectionately known as Ma Sisulu throughout her lifetime by the South African public. In 2004 she was voted 57th in the SABC3′s Great South Africans. She [...]

Martin Luther King  Jr (1929–1968) was an American clergyman and civil-rights leader. He was the son of a pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. King in 1954 became minister of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. He led the black boycott (1955–1956) of segregated city bus lines and in 1956 gained a major [...]

A Pirali Brahmin from Kolkata and the youngest of 13 children born in the Jorasanko mansion to parents Debendranath Tagore (1817 – 1905) and Sarada Devi (1830 – 1875) was a Bengali poet, novelist, musician, painter and playwright who reshaped Bengali literature and music. As author of Gitanjali, he was the first non-European who was awarded [...]

Nelson Mandela International Day was launched by a panel of schoolchildren on Monday in the absence of the recuperating former president.  Foundation spokesperson Sello Hatang said a decision was made ahead of the launch not to mention Madiba’s health to avoid it overshadowing the event.

Monday’s launch, held at the Nelson Mandela Foundations’s premises in Houghton saw [...]

When I came to Atlanta in the late sixties I felt like a new born baby here in the land of Martin Luther King, Andrew Young, and Rap Brown Georgia was by and large the Birmingham of the civil rights movement. My quest for meaning in life and seeking to live for the love of [...]

Originally born Donato Francisco in Westbury,1935. Don Materra grew up in Sophiatown in a time that rejoiced vibrant South African culture. He depicted Sophiatown in his biography Memory is the Weapon, written in 1987, for it’s beauty; picturesque and intimate like most ghettoes. . . . Mansions and quaint cottages . . . stood side [...]

(1928 to 2010) Background Fatima was born in Grey Street (Kwa-Zulu Natal) on 12 August 1928, the daughter of a Muslim father Moosa Meer; and Jewish / Portuguese mother Rachel Farrel, who embraced Islam and took the name Amina. She was the second of nine children. Moosa was born in Surat, Gujarat and came from [...]