THIS WEEK IN HISTORY

running shoes and tights, a pink construction hat and carrying a whistle, a drum and a placard reading “Exhibit White @ Arrogance U.C.T.”, Maxwele’s performance was a radical protest against UCT’s institutional racism and the lack of transformation on campus. By midday Maxwele was joined by other students, resulting in the birth of #RhodesMustFall.

 10 March 1922

Miners’ strike turns violence

A white mineworkers strike, which started in December 1921 turneds violent, with workers occupying police stations, railway stations and mines in the Witwatersrand, attacking a power station and main post office. The strike became known as the Rand Revolt, leading to certain positions in mines being reserved for whites, called Job Reservation.

 10 March 1926

Artist Michael Zondi born

On 10 March 1926, Michael Gagashe Zondi, a South African sculptor was born in Msinga, Greytown He was trained in woodwork at the Swedish Lutheran Mission Trade School. During the late 1950s he received instruction in Fine Arts at the UN, Pietermaritzburg. He obtained certificates in building construction and design and worked at the Appelsbosch mission hospital in Natal, executing the design, construction and decoration for the hospital chapel, whilst doing his sculptors. In 1965, he became only the second black artist to exhibit at the Durban Arts Centre, during the height of apartheid. He worked for the Department of Information until 1972, after which he moved to Johannesburg. Zondi had several exhibitions of his work, and his sculptors are part of art collections across the country and internationally. He has been described as ‘one of the greatest South African sculptors of the 20th century.” Michael Gagashe Zondi passed on 15 March 2008, and was buried in Mtulwa.

 10 March 1978

Journalist Percy Qoboza released from detention

Percy Qoboza, editor of the banned newspaper, The World, was released from detention, together with nine other Black leaders seized in security raids in October 1976. Qoboza was freed as result of an international campaign for his release. After his release, Qoboza remained in the country for another three years and joined the Black weekly, The Voice, which was later also banned. He then joined the Post Transvaal and Sunday Post, two newspapers established to replace the banned World. Qoboza finally succumbed to the government pressure and left the country to live in United States.

 10 March 1990

Welcome Ncita wins International Boxing Federation title

Mdantsane born Welcome Ncita became the first South African to win the International Boxing Federation (IBF) world bantam weight title on 10 March 1990, when he beat Israeli Fabrice Benichou in Tel Aviv, Israel. Known as “The Hawk”, Ncita went on to defend the title seven times. He lost the title to American, Kennedy McKinney in 1992n