CAPE TOWN: Blanche La Guma, anti-apartheid struggle heroine, celebrated her 95th birthday this week.
In the 1940s, while still a teenager, La Guma joined the Communist Party of South Africa, which was later banned under apartheid rule and operated underground.
La Guma, being a midwife, played a key role by distributing party literature across Cape Town.
In 1954, she married Alex La Guma, a comrade in the party and leader of the South African Coloured People’s Organisation, who was later a defendant in the Treason Trial.
“While Alex was away at the Treason Trial, I had my own fight on my hands with the attempt of the Nationalist government to impose apartheid on the nursing profession,” La Guma recalls in her memoir, In the Dark with my Dress on Fire.
In 1957 when the National Party proposed the Nursing Amendment Act to bring nursing in line with the larger policy of apartheid, La Guma organised a 300-women-strong protest in Cape Town and wrote several articles on nursing apartheid for Nursing News, a publication that was later banned.
La Guma was later banned herself for having one of those articles in her possession and was sentenced to imprisonment. Her lawyer Albie Sachs successfully argued in the Supreme Court of Appeal for La Guma’s sentence to be suspended.
“Blanche was the bravest of the brave, the brightest of the bright,” said Sachs, retired Judge of the Constitutional Court.
“She had a little green Morris, or was it an Austin car? And she would drive with it through the potholes and puddles of Windermere and Elsies River to deliver the babies of the poor in their makeshift shanty homes,” recalled Sachs.
“But more than that… she would deliver political news and underground pamphlets, linking her comrades living there to the broader people’s struggle.”
La Guma hid pamphlets in her nursing briefcase, alongside the tools and materials she would use for the delivery of babies.
In 1966, La Guma, her husband and their two young sons left South Africa on exit permits which prevented them from returning home. They lived in exile in the United Kingdom where La Guma continued to work as a midwife and was later appointed head of a maternity ward in London, all the while carrying out duties for the exiled African National Congress after hours.
When asked about her secret to her longevity, La Guma attributed it to her continued fight against injustices.
“When I see something that is wrong, I don’t just let it go. I say my piece to ensure that something will be done,” said La Guma.
La Guma, although still strong and able, said that she tires very easily these days, and gave up cooking her own meals a few months ago. She is still, however, happy to be surrounded by good friends and having a nice chat.
“It was such a pleasure to share the wonderful occasion of Blanche's 95th birthday with her, together with Michael, Fatima and Andre. Her delight in our company in the uplifting environment of Kirstenbosch Garden was so infectious, and it was great to see a glimmer of the vivacious Blanche again as of late she has not always been feeling well,” said Dr Bonita Bennet, a friend and former director of the District Six Museum.
“We are among a number of friends that Blanche has, who have been visiting her over the last while to ensure that she has a healthy dose of good company and shared cups of tea.”
Bennet and her husband, Reverend Michael Weeder, the Dean of St George’s Cathedral have been deeply touched and inspired by the story of the La Gumas.
“Their love survived the years of house arrest, death threats and detention. The personal and the public (nature) of their relationship was underscored by mutual respect and the values instilled in them by the struggle for freedom,” said Weeder.
“Alex La Guma died of a heart attack in Havana on 11 October 1985. With him on the back seat of their car, Blanche frantically headed for the hospital. They got stuck in the late afternoon rush hour on the last bend before the hospital.
“Her name, the bell around his heart, were the last words she heard him say.”
Weekend Argus