STEVE BIKO

Steve Biko was born in King William’s Town, South Africa. He was the third child in an average family where his father was a clerk and his mother was a maid. Biko was not offered the opportunity to know his father because he died when Biko was only four years old. Steve Biko excelled in school as a youth but his political activities caused him to be expelled from Lovedale High School. Biko was still able to continue on to college where he received a scholarship to attend St. Francis College in Natal, a liberal Catholic boarding school. While in Medical School, Biko became involved in the NUSAS (National Union Of South African Students), a multiracial politically moderate organization.

It was while he was in Natal that Biko began truly questioning the apartheid system and the conditions that his people were forced to endure. Biko became more involved in the daily struggle that faced Blacks, and he decided to quit medical school.

In 1968, Steve Biko became the cofounder and first president of the all-Black South African Students’ Organization (SASO) The primary aim of the organization was to raise black consciousness in South Africa through lectures and community activities. Biko concluded that the apartheid system had a psychological effect on the Black population, which had caused Blacks to internalize and believe Whites’ racist stereotypes. According to Biko, Blacks had been convinced that they were inferior to Whites, which resulted in the hopelessness that was prevalent in the Black community. Biko preached Black solidarity to “break the chains of oppression”.

Biko’s political activities eventually drew the attention of the South African government resulting in him being banned in 1973. The banning restricted Biko from talking to more than one person a time in an attempt to suppress the rising political movement. The banning did not stop Biko’s commitment to activism. For the next four years, he continued to spread his message at gatherings and with his underground publication called "Frank Talk". During this period Biko was often harassed, arrested, and detained by the South African Police.

On August 18, 1977, Biko was seized by the police and detained under section 6 of the Terrorism Act. This draconian law had resulted in the loss of freedom of over 40,000 Blacks in South Africa since 1950. The law permitted the police to hold Biko in jail indefinitely, however the end of his term was due to his violent death, not freedom. Biko was held in prison for twenty-four days were he was interrogated, starved, and brutally beaten. It wasn’t until Biko was laying unconscious, that the doctors suggested that he be transported to Pretoria for medical treatment, 740 miles away. On September 12, 1977, Biko became the forty-first person in South Africa to die while being held in the custody of the South African Police.

The South African government claimed that Steve Biko’s death was caused by a hunger strike and claimed their innocence. The then Minister of Police, Jimmy Kruger, was quoted as saying crassly:

"Biko's death leaves me cold."

However, the official autopsy concluded that Biko’s death was due to brain lesion caused by the “application of force to the head”. The officers who were responsible for Biko while he was detained were absolved of any wrong doing by a South African court.

Biko’s tragic death had a great impact on the people of South Africa and stunned the world. His funeral was attended by more than 15,000 mourners, not including the thousands that were turned away by the police. Steve Biko’s legacy lives on through the struggle he helped to ignite and through the freedoms that South Africans now possess.

BUSI MHLONGO

Drawing on various South African styles such as mbaqanga, maskanda, marabi and traditional Zulu, fused with contemporary elements from jazz, funk, rock, gospel, rap, opera, reggae and West African music she produced a fresh and exciting sound. Her infectious music and singing style have a universal appeal and her lyrics carry powerful and poignant messages. In the 1960s, she adopted the artistic name Vickie; only later did she became known by Busi Mhlongo. She was an initiated sangoma, which heavily influenced her music.

Mhlongo has worked with other top African folk / pop artists, like Hugh Masekela, Dr. Philip Tabane, Mabe Thobejane, and many legends - Robert “Doc” Mthalane making meticulously produced, melodic and modern South African music.

Her work also spaned more urban styles, with several tracks on UrbanZulu being remixed for the dancefloor.

In 2000, Busi scooped three awards at the FNB South African Music Awards for best female artist, best adult contemporary album (Africa), and best African pop album. Busi has since also scored a KORA award and MELT has released a compilation called Indiza with two new tracks produced by Brice Wassy and a series of remixes by Club 3.30.

The first South African music Benefit concert was held by South African Broadcasting Corporation to celebrate Busi’s birthday and raise fund for her hospital bills, President Thabo Mbeki was one of the Honourable guests. Her album UrbanZulu was the very first time that Maskanda has been expressed by a Zulu woman commercially to an international audience.
Death

Busi had been diagnosed with cancer and was undergoing treatment when she died on June 15, 2010. She was with her family, who still live at Ntuzuma, just outside Kwa Mashu.

RAY PHIRI

 

It has been indeed a long trip for Ray Phiri. From early days in Mpumalanga, where he was born and raised, where he used to dance to his troubadour father’s puppet shows. Ray had his first break when he, in 1962, managed to dance for the legendary Dark City Sisters when they performed in Mpumalanga. He made enough money giving him a chance to travel to Johannesburg.

He became founder member of the soul music giants of the 1970’s, the Cannibals which were later joined by the late Mpharanyana. When the Cannibals disbanded Ray founded Stimela, with whom he conceived gold and platinum-winning albums like Fire, Passion and Ecstacy, Look, Listen and Decide as well as the controversial People Don’t Talk So Let’s Talk.

It came as no surprise when one of their most memorable tracks Whispers in the Deep was restricted for broadcast by the old South African Broadcasting Corporation. In fact, this contributed heavily to Ray and Stimela’s popularity.




It was in the early 1990’s that American singer and musician Paul Simon asked Ray along with Ladysmith Black Mambazo to join his Graceland project, which was successful but also helped the South Africans to make names for themselves abroad. Ray was to collaborate with Paul Simon again on Simon’s Rhythm of the Saints album, which saw him perform on stages such as Central Park and Madison Square Garden as well as appearing on top television shows in the US.

Ray has subsequently released a solo album, and has been active in education and cultural work, especially in his home province of Mapumalanga. His Mapumalanga based studio and production house have also had a hand in several productions.

Commencing 2003, Ray has been playing a part in a revitalised Stimela, who aim to take to the road in South Africa later in 2003.

Instrumentation:
vocals, guitar
Genre: African Jazz, fusion, mbaqanga

CHRIS HANI

Hani was born on 28 June 1942 in the small town of Cofimvaba in a rural village called kuSabalele Transkei. He was the fifth of six children. He attended Lovedale school and later studied modern and classical literature at the University of Fort Hare. Hani, in an interview on the Wankie campaign, also mentions that he is a Rhodes University graduate.
 

Political career

At age 15 Hani joined the ANC Youth League. As a student he was active in protests against the Bantu Education Act. Following his graduation, he joined Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the ANC. Following his arrest under the Suppression of Communism Act, he went into exile in Lesotho in 1963.
He received military training in the Soviet Union and served in campaigns in the Rhodesian Bush War in what is now Zimbabwe. Though the combined operations of MK and ZIPRA in the late 1960s were a military failure, they consolidated Hani’s reputation as a brave soldier of the first black army to take the field against aparthied. His role as a fighter from the earliest days of MK’s exile (following the arrest of Nelson Mandela and the other internal MK leaders at Rivonia) was an important part in the fierce loyalty Hani enjoyed later as MK’s commander. In Lesotho he was the target of assassination attempts, and he eventually moved to the ANC’s headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia. As head of Umkhonto we Sizwe, he was responsible for the suppression of a mutiny by dissident ANC members in detention camps, but denied any role in abuses including torture and murder.

Having spent time as a clandestine organiser in South Africa in the mid-1970s, he permanently returned to South Africa following the unbanning of the ANC in 1990, and took over from Joe Slovo as head of the South African Communist Party in 1991. He supported the suspension of the ANC’s armed struggle in favour of negotiations. However, he stated that he would not rule out violence in a speech on National television shortly before his death.
 

Assassination

Chris Hani was assassinated on 10 April 1993 outside his home in Dawn Park, a racially-mixed suburb of Boksburg. He was accosted by a Polish far-right immigrant named Janusz Waluś, who shot him in the head as he stepped out of his car. Waluś fled the scene, but was arrested soon afterwards after Hani’s neighbour, a white woman, called the police. Clive Derby-Lewis, a senior South African Conservative Party M.P., who had lent Waluś his pistol, was also arrested for complicity in Hani’s murder.
Hani’s assassination was part of a plot by the far-right in South Africa to derail the negotiations to end apartheid.
Historically, the assassination is seen as a turning point. Serious tensions followed the assassination, with fears that the country would erupt in violence. Nelson Mandela addressed the nation appealing for calm, in a speech regarded as ‘presidential’ even though he was not yet president of the country:
“     Tonight I am reaching out to every single South African, black and white, from the very depths of my being. A white man, full of prejudice and hate, came to our country and committed a deed so foul that our whole nation now teeters on the brink of disaster. A white woman, of Afrikaner origin, risked her life so that we may know, and bring to justice, this assassin. The cold-blooded murder of Chris Hani has sent shock waves throughout the country and the world. ... Now is the time for all South Africans to stand together against those who, from any quarter, wish to destroy what Chris Hani gave his life for – the freedom of all of us.     ”

While riots did follow the assassination, the two sides of the negotiation process were galvanised into action, and they soon agreed that democratic elections should take place on 27 April 1994, just over a year after Hani’s assassination.
Assassins’ conviction and amnesty hearing

Both Janusz Waluś and Clive Derby-Lewis were sentenced to death for the murder. Clive Derby-Lewis’s wife Gaye Derby-Lewis, also a senior Conservative Party figure, was acquitted. The two men’s sentences were commuted to life imprisonment when the death penalty was abolished as a result of a Constitutional Court ruling in 1995.

Hani’s killers appeared before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, claiming political motivation for their crimes and applying for amnesty on the basis that they had acted on the orders of the Conservative Party. The Hani family was represented by anti-apartheid lawyer George Bizos. Their applications were denied when the TRC ruled that they were not acting on orders. They are still in prison, parole having been denied most recently by the Cape High Court on 17 March 2009.
Conspiracy theories surrounding assassination

Hani’s assassination has attracted numerous conspiracy theories about outside involvement. The final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, however, said that it “was unable to find evidence that the two murderers convicted of the killing of Chris Hani took orders from international groups, security forces or from higher up in the right-wing echelons.”

LETTA MBULU

Names: Mbulu, Letta 

Born: Soweto, Johannesburg, South Africa

In summary: Letta Mbulu was born in Soweto and, during her teens, she toured South Africa and then England with the musical King Kong. She returned to South Africa at

Letta Mbulu was born in Soweto and, during her teens, she toured South Africa and then England with the musical King Kong. She returned to South Africa at the end of the tour but was soon forced into exile in the United States. While in the states she was invited to tour with Cannonball Adderly and soon thereafter joined forces with Harry Belafonte. Her relationship with Harry Belafonte became a rewarding musical venture that took Letta on several world tours. She married a fellow South African musician, Caiphus Semenya, whom she met while touring with King Kong and together they released many hits.

She has been a member of the prestigious Union of South African Artists, where she became exposed to folk, American Jazz and Brazilian music, and has worked with the likes of Michael Jackson. She also acted in the film Roots for which she received an Emmy award. Her other screen appearances include A warm December with Sidney Pottier and The Colour Purple. She is a founding member of the South African Artists United (SAAU) an organisation which was established in 1986. This organisation launched the musical Buwa that carried a political and historical theme with Letta in the leading role.

On their return to South Africa, Letta and Caiphus performed in the Unity ‘91 Festival that marked the first time they had shared a stage with other fellow musicians on home soil. In 1992 she released a new album entitled Not Yet Uhuru. The album was Letta’s first to be recorded in South Africa since her return and it was arranged and produced by her multi-talented husband Caiphus.

SAMORA MACHEL

Samora Moisés Machel (September 29,1933-19 Octobre 1986),was a prominent leader of Frelimo and dedicated military man.He presided over the independence of Mozambique from Portugal in 1975 and became its first president.


Samora Moisés Machel was born in 1933 in the village of Chilembene, Mozambique, to a poor family. He studied in Catholic school but eventually begun to work against Portuguese colonial rule. 1962 Machel joined left-wing FRELIMO guerilla movement and received military training. He became leader of FRELIMO on 1968. On 1969 he became its president.

Mozambique became independent in the aftermath of Portugal military coup in 1974. FRELIMO took over in Mozambique in June 25 1975. Machel became the president. He advocated the formation of society based on Marxist ideals.

Machel had to face economical troubles and side effects of the Rhodesian civil war. Mozambique was economically dependent of South Africa with its hostile Apartheid government and had to fight Renamo guerilla movement they supported. Soviet economic aid was sporadic. At the same time he supported African National Congress and allowed South African and Rhodesian rebels train in Mozambique. He remained a popular ruler.

On October 19, 1986 Machel was on his way back from an international meeting in Lusaka in Tupolev 134 plane when the plane crashed into the hillside in the Lebombo Mountains. 10 people survived but Machel and 33 others died, some of them members of his government. The accident was attributed to the error of Russian pilot but there has been speculation of complicity of South African security forces and that the plane had been intentionally diverted by a false navigational beacon signal.

Machel's successor was Joaquim Chissano.

His widow, Graça Machel, would later marry Nelson Mandela.

www.africansuccess.org

DONNA SUMMER

LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948 – May 17, 2012), known by the stage name Donna Summer, was an American singer-songwriter who gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s. She had a mezzo-soprano vocal range, and was a five-time Grammy Award winner. Summer was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach number one on the U.S. Billboard chart, and she also charted four number-one singles in the United States within a 13-month period.

Summer died on May 17, 2012. The Associated Press reports that she died in the morning at her home in Key West, Florida at age 63 following a battle with cancer. The Bradenton Herald quotes “Sarasota County records” stating that she lived in Englewood, Florida at the time of her death. The reference did not state the place of her death.

Early life and career

Summer was born Ladonna Adrian Gaines on December 31, 1948 in Boston, Massachusetts to parents Andrew and Mary Gaines and was one of seven children. She and her family were raised in the Boston neighborhood of Dorchester. Her father, Andrew Gaines, was a butcher, and her mother Mary, was a schoolteacher. Summer’s mother later recalled that from the time she could talk, Summer would often sing: “She literally loved to sing. She used to go through the house singing, singing. She sang for breakfast and for lunch and for supper.”

Summer’s performance debut occurred at church when she was ten, when she replaced a vocalist that had failed to show up. Her priest invited Summer to perform, judging from her small frame and voice that she would be an “amusing spectacle”, but instead Summer’s voice recalled a voice older than her years and frame. Summer herself recalled that as she sang, “I started crying, everybody else started crying. It was quite an amazing moment in my life and at some point after I heard my voice came out I felt like God was saying to me ‘Donna, you’re going to be very, very famous’ and I knew from that day on that I would be famous.”

Summer later attended Boston’s Jeremiah E. Burke High School, where she performed in school musicals and was considered popular. She was also something of a troublemaker, skipping home to attend parties, circumventing her parents’ strict curfew. In 1967, just weeks before graduation, Summer left for New York where she was a member of the blues-rock band, Crow. After they were passed by every record label, they agreed to break up. Summer stayed in New York and auditioned for a role in the counterculture musical, Hair. When Melba Moore was cast in the part, Summer agreed to take the role in the Munich production of the show. She moved to Munich after getting her parents’ reluctant approval.

Summer remained in Munich and later learned fluent German. She participated in the musicals Ich Bin Ich (the German version of The Me Nobody Knows), Godspell and Show Boat. Within three years, she moved to Vienna, Austria and joined the Viennese Folk Opera. She briefly toured with an ensemble vocal group called FamilyTree, the creation of producer Guenter “Yogi” Lauke. In 1971, Summer released her first single, a cover of The Jaynetts’ “Sally Go ‘Round the Roses”, from a one-off European deal with Decca Records. In 1972, she issued the single, “If You Walkin’ Alone” on Philips. In 1974, she married Austrian actor Helmuth Sommer and had a daughter, Mimi, the following year. Citing marital problems caused by her affair with German artist (and future live-in boyfriend) Peter Mühldorfer, she divorced Helmuth. She kept his last name, but Anglicised it to “Summer”. She provided backing vocals on producer-keyboardist Veit Marvos on his 1972 Ariola records release, Nice To See You, credited as “Gayn Pierre”. Several subsequent singles included Summer performing with the group, but she often denied singing on any of the Marvos releases. The name “Gayn Pierre” was also used by Donna while performing in Godspell with Helmuth Sommer during 1972.

SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org