James Mpanza: Difference between revisions
Victuallers (talk | contribs) more |
Victuallers (talk | contribs) bit |
||
| Line 46: | Line 46: | ||
In 1927 he was released and he made his living by teaching in [[Pretoria]] before he moved to [[Johannesburg]]. Here he would ride a horse thorough Orlando giving rise to an air of eccentricity.<ref name=bio/> |
In 1927 he was released and he made his living by teaching in [[Pretoria]] before he moved to [[Johannesburg]]. Here he would ride a horse thorough Orlando giving rise to an air of eccentricity.<ref name=bio/> |
||
In 1944, despite being seen as controversial, he persuaded |
In April 1944, despite being seen as controversial, he persuaded 8,000 people to follow him from Orlando to create a new township<ref name=soweto/> on the veld nearby with himself as mayor. By 1946 there were 20,000 people there and Mpanza charged a fee to join the camp and to claim a site and then two shillings and sixpence every week. In return the squatters had their own police force and Mpanza operatied informal courts at [[James Mpanza House|his home in Orlando, but no health care. The death of Mpanza's son, Dumisani, was put down to poor health care.<ref name=mandela/> The squatters had left the slums of Orlando but their plight will still not certain and Mpanza got the nickname of "Sofasonke" ("we shall all die") as he added his opinion of their outlook if they had no help. It was this rhetoric that got him the nickname but it also encouraged the funding necessary to convert his shantytown into the town of "South Western Townships" or Soweto. It was not all rhetoric however as he used his loyal following to create candidates for the Orlando Advisory Board.<ref name=bio/> |
||
| ⚫ | Mpanza successfully appealed against a government deportation order that would have exiled him in [[Natal]].<ref name=exile>{{cite book|last=compiled|first=with photo's by Bob Gosani ... [et al.] ;|title=The Fifties people of South Africa|year=1987|publisher=J.R.A. Bailey|location=[Lanseria, South Africa]|isbn=0620105291|page=113|edition=1st ed.|coauthors=Schadeberg, edited by Jurgen}}</ref> This allowed him to continue to influence the Orlando Advisory Board. He helped to set up the [[Soweto Urban Banto Council]] in the 1960s. |
||
==Legacy== |
|||
He died in 1970 in Orlando East and he was given a large civic funeral. He was buried in cemetery. Mpanza's [[Sofasonke Party]] still thrived and in 1971 it supplied the majority the council.<ref name=bio/> Twenty years later it was still a force in South African politics.<ref name=mandela/> |
|||
| ⚫ | Mpanza successfully appealed against a government deportation order that would have exiled him in [[Natal]].<ref name=exile>{{cite book|last=compiled|first=with photo's by Bob Gosani ... [et al.] ;|title=The Fifties people of South Africa|year=1987|publisher=J.R.A. Bailey|location=[Lanseria, South Africa]|isbn=0620105291|page=113|edition=1st ed.|coauthors=Schadeberg, edited by Jurgen}}</ref> This allowed him to continue to influence the Orlando Advisory Board. He helped to set up the [[Soweto Urban Banto Council]] in the 1960s. |
||
==References== |
==References== |
||
| Line 71: | Line 76: | ||
|PLACE OF BIRTH=Georgedale |
|PLACE OF BIRTH=Georgedale |
||
|DATE OF DEATH=23 September, 1970 |
|DATE OF DEATH=23 September, 1970 |
||
|PLACE OF DEATH= |
|PLACE OF DEATH=Orlando East |
||
}} |
}} |
||
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mpanza, James}} |
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mpanza, James}} |
||
Revision as of 07:23, 21 June 2013
Mpanza James | |
|---|---|
| Born | 15 May, 1889 Georgedale |
| Died | 23 September, 1970 |
| Nationality | South African |
| Known for | father of Soweto and founding a party |
James Mpanza (1889 - 1970) was a squatter leader in Johannesburg, South Africa from the mid-1940s until the late 1960s. In 1944 he led the land invasion that resulted in the founding of modern Soweto.[1] Mpanza was at one time known as 'the father of Soweto'.[2]
Life
Mpanza was born on 15 May 1889 in Georgedale, today part of Cato Ridge. His father Ventile Mbihlana Mpanza, an ox cart driver, and his wife Evelyn had four children but their eldest son died before manhood. Mpanze studied until year 6 at Georgedale Primary School before qualifying with a third class teaching certificate at Indelani in Nepal. He was a clerk and interpreter at a solicitors office when he was eighteen, he was convicted of fraud in 1912. He came to notice when he was convicted for murder in 1915 of an Indian shopkeeper called Adam. He appealed his own case arguing that he was somewhere else at the time.[3] He was reprieved but he still had a life sentence.[4] He served thirteen years in jail moving from place to place as he misbehaved and attacked warders. At Cinderella prison in Boksburg at the end of World War One he became a Christian and wrote a short book[5] on his ideas and began preaching to his fellow prisoners.[6]
In 1927 he was released and he made his living by teaching in Pretoria before he moved to Johannesburg. Here he would ride a horse thorough Orlando giving rise to an air of eccentricity.[6]
In April 1944, despite being seen as controversial, he persuaded 8,000 people to follow him from Orlando to create a new township[2] on the veld nearby with himself as mayor. By 1946 there were 20,000 people there and Mpanza charged a fee to join the camp and to claim a site and then two shillings and sixpence every week. In return the squatters had their own police force and Mpanza operatied informal courts at [[James Mpanza House|his home in Orlando, but no health care. The death of Mpanza's son, Dumisani, was put down to poor health care.[3] The squatters had left the slums of Orlando but their plight will still not certain and Mpanza got the nickname of "Sofasonke" ("we shall all die") as he added his opinion of their outlook if they had no help. It was this rhetoric that got him the nickname but it also encouraged the funding necessary to convert his shantytown into the town of "South Western Townships" or Soweto. It was not all rhetoric however as he used his loyal following to create candidates for the Orlando Advisory Board.[6]
Mpanza successfully appealed against a government deportation order that would have exiled him in Natal.[7] This allowed him to continue to influence the Orlando Advisory Board. He helped to set up the Soweto Urban Banto Council in the 1960s.
Legacy
He died in 1970 in Orlando East and he was given a large civic funeral. He was buried in cemetery. Mpanza's Sofasonke Party still thrived and in 1971 it supplied the majority the council.[6] Twenty years later it was still a force in South African politics.[3]
References
- ^ James Mpanza, SA History Online
- ^ a b An Overview of Soweto, accessed Hune 2013
- ^ a b c Mandela, ed. by: E.J. Verwey ; forew. by: Nelson (1995). New dictionary of South African biography (1st ed. ed.). Pretoria: HSRC Publishers. p. 187. ISBN 0796916489.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help);|first=has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ "Community leader James Sofasonke Mpanza is born". South Africa History Online. Retrieved 21 June 2013.
- ^ Izimpi zendlela yonkresku (The Battles of the Christian's Pathway).
- ^ a b c d "James Mpanza". South Africa History Online. Retrieved 21 June 2013.
- ^ compiled, with photo's by Bob Gosani ... ;; et al. (1987). The Fifties people of South Africa (1st ed. ed.). [Lanseria, South Africa]: J.R.A. Bailey. p. 113. ISBN 0620105291.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help); Explicit use of et al. in:|first=(help); Unknown parameter|coauthors=ignored (|author=suggested) (help)CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Further reading
- Bonner, P. 'The Politics of Black Squatter Movements on the Rand, 1944-1952, Radical History Review, 1990
- Gerhart G.M and Karis T. (ed). From Protest to challenge: A documentary History of African Politics in South Africa: 1882-1964, Vol.4 Political Profiles 1882 – 1964. Hoover Institution Press: Stanford University, 1977
- Stadler, A. 'Birds in the Cornfield: Squatter movements in Johannesburg, 1944-1947', Journal of South African Studies, 1979
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
