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ADELAIDE TAMBO

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Adelaide Tambo. Photo by Gallo Images
Adelaide Tambo. Photo by Gallo Images

Birthplace: Top location, Vereeniging

Born: 18 July 1929

Died: 31 January 2007

 “… like all lawyers they charged fees, but no one was turned away at Mandela & Tambo, because they did not have money ... Africans were carrying passes, and they were arrested at every little excuse. The office was always full of people who came there to ask for help.” – Adelaide Tambo

 In 1939 when Adelaide Tambo was 10 years old, she witnessed young cops push around her frail granddad and call him “boy”. This was the moment her political life began, and she swore to fight the white oppressors until the end. Tambo started working for the ANC as a courier in 1944 while also studying at Orlando High in Soweto. She went on to qualify as a nurse in Pretoria.

Tambo joined the ANC Youth League and became a branch chairwoman at the age of 18. She met Oliver Tambo at an ANC branch meeting, and went on to marry him in December 1956.

Oliver and Adelaide Tambo left the country in 1960 after being asked to do so by the ANC. They continued their work for the struggle in London and Tambo resumed her job as a courier, delivering sensitive information to activists.

After nearly 30 years in exile, the Tambos returned home in December 1990. Tambo served one term as an MP in Parliament, but in 1994 declined a second term.

Tambo’s life-long efforts to liberate black South Africans have been widely recognised. She was awarded the Noel Foundation Life award for starting the anti-apartheid movement in Britain, and the first Oliver Tambo/Johnny Makatini freedom award in 1995.

On 31 January 2007, Ma Tambo passed away at her home in Hyde Park, Joburg at the age of 77. She was given a state funeral. She was buried next to her husband Oliver (who had died in April 1993).

She and Oliver are survived by their three children, Dali, Thembi and Tselane, and several grandchildren.

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