PIONEER
Joe Slovo
Human rights activist | SACP member | Negotiator
Born: 23 May 1926 Died: 6 January 1995
“Humankind can never attain real freedom until a society has been built in which no person has the freedom to exploit another person.”
Who is
Joe Slovo?
Founding member of the Congress of Democrats and Chief of Staff of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), who was active in the African National Congress (ANC) and South African Communist Party (SACP).
Professions
and Roles
Anti-apartheid activist, Treason Trialist, ANC politician, negotiator during the transition, Minister of Housing.
Best Known For
Anti-apartheid activism and leadership roles within the SACP and ANC.
Life highlights
- Slovo was born Yossel Mashel Slovo, in the village of Obeliai in Lithuania.
- Slovo became an active member of the SACP from the 1940s. He was well known for his work as a defence lawyer in political trials.
- In 1950, Slovo and his wife Ruth First were among the first 600 people named under the Suppression of Communism Act, and subjected to various restrictions.
- In 1953, Slovo was a founding member of the Congress of Democrats. He represented the organisation on the national consultative committee of the Congress Alliance.
- In 1954, he was banned from attending all gatherings but continued his political activities covertly.
- Slovo contributed to the drafting of the Freedom Charter.
- In 1956, Slovo together with other Congress activists, were charged with treason. He acted as both a member of the defence team as well as one of the accused. The charges against him were dropped in late 1958.
- During the state of emergency in 1960, Slovo was detained for four months.
- Slovo was one of the first members of MK and served as its chief of staff until 1987.
- He left South Africa in 1963 on an ‘external mission’, but while away his wife was detained for four months. On her release, she left the country together with their three daughters.
- Slovo served on the revolutionary council of the ANC from 1969 until its dissolution in 1983.
- Slovo continued to work for the ANC and SACP while abroad. He established an operational centre for the ANC in Maputo, Mozambique in 1977.
- In 1982, his wife Ruth First was killed in a parcel bomb explosion in Maputo.
- In 1985, at the ANC consultative conference in Zambia, Slovo became the first white member to serve on the ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC).
- In 1986, Slovo was appointed general secretary of the SACP. He left his position at MK in order to relieve the pressure of too many duties.
- In 1990, after the SACP and ANC were unbanned, Slovo was elected as the SACP’s general secretary, but he retired in 1991 due to ill health. He was subsequently elected as the Chairman of the SACP.
- In 1991, Slovo was re-elected to the ANC’s NEC and also served as the SACP’s representative on the National Peace Committee. He presented at CODESA and served on its working group dealing with constitutional principles and a constitution-making body and process. He was a key negotiator between various anti-apartheid groups and the ruling National Party, and was personally responsible for a ‘sunset clause’ which led to the power-sharing Government of National Unity, GNU.
- In 1994, Slovo was elected to Cabinet and served as Minister of Housing.
IN THEIR OWN WORDS
“Sooner or later we will be back at the negotiating table. I believe that it is urgent to arm ourselves with a more adequate theoretical framework within which to determine our approaches. Some of our responses have been too ad hoc and have sometimes been influenced by a passing mood and a passion generated by an event or a particularly outrageous pronouncement by the other side.
We are negotiating with the regime because an objective balance of forces makes this a feasible political strategy. Negotiations that are based on vague psychological criteria are bound to mislead and falter. Of course, where there is some reciprocal trust, then that is a bonus.”
– Ayesha Dawood
IN THE WORDS OF OTHERS
“Joe also understood that tactics and strategy had to be adjusted to the situation and not imposed on it. He knew when to fight and when to negotiate, so when the movement decided to engage with the apartheid regime in negotiations, Comrade Joe was in the first ANC team at Groote Schuur. He threw his weight behind the process and fought vigorously and effectively to fasten the kinds of compromise which were needed to take us forward.
In due course we will adopt a new constitution … from the details that Joe has had to capture, to democratic, majority rule. We are supremely confident that the constitution which the ANC has designed will essentially be part of the constitution of this country. That constitution must mirror the hopes and aspirations of the people who gave us apartheid rule and we will allow no force whatsoever, either in this country or elsewhere, to stop us from passing a constitution which contains those hopes and aspirations.
It is therefore all the more timely and fitting for us to pay tribute to Joe for his tenacity, his involvement, his creativity. The final constitution will be a living monument to his tireless efforts. He understood that our tripartite alliance was of fundamental importance. He knew that the durability of the alliance, of the ANC and the SA Communist Party, lay in strengthening such an independent formation and in securing their co-operation on a voluntary basis. Joe’s own life exemplifies that relationship. His greatness lay in his success, enabling each of these two organisations individually and both of them together.”
– Nelson Mandela, then President of South Africa
“Second to Oliver Tambo, he was probably the best loved leader of the ANC, both inside and outside South Africa. In the camps of Umkhonto we Sizwe he was a living legend, whose name was invoked in marching songs and the chants that accompanied the toyi-toyi.”
– Pallo Jordan, then Member of Parliament for the ANC
