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This resource is hosted by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, but was compiled and authored by Padraig O’Malley. It is the product of almost two decades of research and includes analyses, chronologies, historical documents, and interviews from the apartheid and post-apartheid eras.

Gwala, Harry

In 1942 Gwala joined the South Africa Communist Party (SACP) and in 1944 he joined the ANC Youth League. He established the Rubber and Cable Workers Union in Howick and was consequently listed under the Suppression of Communism Act .In 1952 he was served with a two-year banning order.

Gwala became active underground after the ANC was banned in 1960 until his arrest in 1964 for sabotage and for recruiting members for Umkontho we Sizwe. He was sent to Robben Island for eight years and released in 1972. He was again arrested in 1976 along with other ANC stalwarts because of their involvement in a workers' strike. In 1977 he was sentenced to life imprisonment on Robben Island. He was released from prison in 1988 because he was suffering from motor neuron disease.

After the ANC was unbanned in 1990, Gwala was elected the first Chairperson of the ANC in the Natal Midlands. In 1991 he was elected to the ANC National Executive on which he served until 1994. He was nominated to the SACP Central Committee in 1994, but was suspended in the same year. He remained a loyal SACP member until his death.

After the April 1994 election, Gwala was nominated as a provincial member of the KwaZulu-Natal legislature, and also served as Chief ANC Whip.

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