Thu 30 April 2020:
Veteran South African anti-apartheid activist Denis Goldberg, who stood trial alongside late President Nelson Mandela, has died. Goldberg, who had lung cancer, died just before midnight on Wednesday at his home in Cape Town. He was 87 years old.
He was considered a stalwart of the South African liberation struggle and was the only white member of the African National Congress’s (ANC’s) military wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), to be arrested and sentenced for armed resistance to white-minority rule.
Goldberg spent 22 years in prison for his involvement with the ANC’s fight against apartheid, the racist system of oppression imposed by the white minority government.
The Rivonia court proceeding was the trial in which Mandela and other anti-apartheid activists were convicted of sabotage in 1964 and sentenced to lengthy prison terms.
Tributes poured in on Thursday for Goldberg, with many acknowledging the role he played in the fight against apartheid.
“His commitment to ethical leadership was unflinching and even during his advanced age he formed part of the movement of veterans of the struggle calling for reassertion of moral center of society,” President Cyril Ramaphosa said.
“We will hold him in our thoughts and prayers as we say farewell at a time when we are not allowed to gather in numbers to say our goodbyes.”
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