1976 Soweto uprising leader Dan Sechaba Montsitsi dies

Dan Sechaba Motsistsi, one of the student leaders who participated in the 1976 Soweto uprising, has passed away.

Health Minister Dr Joe Phaahla confirmed the news on Friday morning during a media briefing on government’s fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. The minister said Montsistsi died on Thursday evening from Covid-related complications.

“Before I went to bed late last night, I got a very distressing message that one of my very own old comrades and colleague, comrade Dan Sechaba Motsistsi, passed away last night,” Phaahla said.

ALSO READ: Black Consciousness Movement’s role in 1976 uprising ‘ignored’

“This is not just a statistic, but it’s people who at all times who are known by somebody. We want to pass our condolences to the family of comrade Dan Sechaba Motsistsi, his children and the rest of the family.”

Montsitsi was in his early 20s on 16 June 1976 when students marched against the apartheid government’s imposition of the Afrikaans language as a medium of instruction in schools

A year later, in June 1977, he was arrested by police and tortured while in custody.

Montsistsi, Tsietsi Mashinini and Khotso Seatlholo were among the three key leaders of the Soweto uprising who became presidents of the then Soweto Students’ Representative Council.

Mashinini and Seatlholo have since passed away.

After 1994, Montsitsi became a member of South Africa’s first democratic Parliament and served as a member of the joint standing committee of defence as well as other select committees.

The director-general of the GCIS, Phumla Williams, said government was sadden by his death.

“Montsitsi was part of the youth of 1976 that contributed towards the realisation of free and just society. He was known for being vocal in the fight for equal education for the youth.

“As a country, we are grateful for the resilience and determination by the youth of 1976 that was led by leaders like Montsisi who stayed the cause for a fight for a free and just democratic South Africa,” Williams said in a statement.