Dan Habedi
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22 March 1952
Dan Habedi | |
|---|---|
| Member of the National Assembly | |
| In office 26 April 2004 – 7 June 2004 | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Daniel Ntjammu Habedi 22 March 1952 |
| Citizenship | South Africa |
| Party | Azanian People's Organisation |
Daniel Ntjammu Habedi (born 22 March 1952) is a South African politician and former anti-apartheid activist. He is a former secretary-general of the Azanian People's Organisation and represented the party in the National Assembly from April to June 2004; his tenure was cut short by the Electoral Court's finding that the seat had been allocated to the wrong party.
During apartheid, Habedi was a teacher in Soweto and an activist in the Black Consciousness movement.
Habedi was born on 22 March 1952 in Alexandra, a township outside Johannesburg in the former Transvaal.[1] He was one of seven siblings and his father, Herman Habedi, was a labourer. Before matriculating in Pretoria in 1970, Habedi attended school in Hammanskraal, where he became interested in anti-apartheid politics after hearing speeches by Black Consciousness leaders, Steve Biko and Barney Pityana among them.[1] He qualified as a teacher at Hebron College in Pretoria in 1972, and he later completed a bachelor's degree in psychology and sociology at the University of South Africa in 1984.[1]
While enrolled at Hebron College, Habedi joined the Black People's Convention (BPC), a Black Consciousness organisation.[1] He remained active in the BPC while holding his first teaching post at Mabopane. In early 1975, while attending the SASO/BPC trial as a spectator, he was detained under the Terrorism Act and detained for two weeks at Pretoria Central Prison. Shortly afterwards, he was dismissed from his teaching post for insubordination.[1] After that, he moved to Lofentse Secondary School in Orlando, Soweto. His tenure there coincided with the 1976 Soweto uprising, and he was a member of the Soweto Teachers' Action Committee, formed in solidarity with the uprising's student activists. In 1977, Habedi and other members of the action committee resigned from their teaching jobs.[1]
Also in the aftermath of the uprising, the BPC and other Black Consciousness organisations were banned by the apartheid government. Instead, Habedi joined the Azanian People's Organisation (AZAPO), a new Black Consciousness grouping, after it was formed in 1978.[1] He moved to Dobsonville for a teaching job from 1979 to 1982, and during that period, between 1980 and 1981, he was the chairperson of AZAPO's Dobsonville branch. In 1982, he returned to Soweto for a post at Orlando High School, and he was projects coordinator for AZAPO's Soweto branch from 1982 to 1983. In December 1984, he was elected to the AZAPO Central Committee for the first time when he was elected as its regional vice-president for the Transvaal.[1]