Ramaphosa Marks Passing of Anti-Apartheid Stalwart Essop Pahad

(Bloomberg) -- South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said that anti-apartheid veteran Essop Pahad has died.

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Rahamposa said in a statement Thursday that Pahad, a member of the African National Congress leadership in exile during the apartheid years who served in the government of President Thabo Mbeki, had passed away at the age of 84.

“Security crackdowns, banning and exile shaped Essop Pahad’s contribution over decades to our struggle,” Ramaphosa said. “He served our nation with pride, principle, pragmatism, and a charm that lived comfortably alongside a tongue that could lash severely at the right provocation.”

Pahad joined the Transvaal Indian Congress, which like the ANC stood against discrimination, in 1958. Active in student politics in Johannesburg during the early 1960s, he was arrested and spent two weeks in prison. He was later banned and went into exile in December 1964.

While in exile he studied in Moscow, received military training in Angola and served on the regional command of the ANC’s political and military wing in London. He returned to South Africa in 1990, the year that the ban on the ANC was lifted.

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