Mamphela ramphele helen zille biography

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  • Mamphela Ramphele

    South African activist and politician (born 1947)

    Mamphela Aletta Ramphele (; born 28 December 1947) is a South African politician, anti-apartheid activist, medical doctor and businesswoman. She was a partner of anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko, with whom she had two children. She is a former vice-chancellor at the University of Cape Town and a former managing director at the World Bank. Ramphele founded the political party Agang South Africa in February 2013 but withdrew from politics in July 2014. Since 2018, she has been the co-president of the Club of Rome.

    Early life

    Ramphele, a Mopedi, was born in the Bochum District in Northern Transvaal (now Limpopo). She completed her schooling at Setotolwane High School in 1966 and subsequently enrolled for pre-medical courses at the University of the North. Her mother, Rangoato Rahab, and her father, Pitsi Eliphaz Ramphele were primary school teachers. In 1944, her father was promoted as headmaster of Stephanus Hofmeyer School. Ramphele contracted severe whooping cough at the age of three months. The wife of the local church minister, Dominee Lukas van der Merwe, gave her mother medical advice and bought medicines for the sick child that saved her life.

    In 1955, Ramphele witnessed a conflict between a racist Afrikaner church minister and the people of the village of Kranspoort. This contributed to her political awakening.

    Education

    Ramphele attended the G. H. Frantz Secondary School but in January 1962 she left for Bethesda Normal School, a boarding school which was part of the Bethesda teachers training college. In 1964, she moved to Setotolwane High School for her matriculation where she was one of only two girls in her class. On completion of her schooling in 1966, in 1967, Ramphele enrolled for pre-medical courses at the University of the North. In 1968, she was accepted into the University of Natal Medical School

    Zille, Ramphele, Mazibuko, Ntuli: The trouble with being female in politics

    At time of writing, there is no longer any doubt that Mamphela Ramphele and Helen Zille have together presided over one of the most embarrassing political fiascos in recent South African history. The fact of their being female should be irrelevant to the response to this, although – predictably – there are already signs that it won’t be. But leaving Ramphele’s “reneging” out of the picture for a second, it’s worth examining whether political aspiration is greeted differently if it comes from a woman.

    South African political discourse, while often brutal and sometimes puerile across the board, does not treat men and women the same way. This is evident in the negative attention paid to the physical appearance of figures like DA parliamentary leader Lindiwe Mazibuko. It is evident in the routine sexualising of female politicians; to take just one example, the comments of erstwhile ANC Youth League leaders Julius Malema and Floyd Shivambu in 2009 suggesting that Helen Zille had stocked her Cabinet with “boyfriends and concubines”. It is evident in the fact that the word “girl” is often used to describe female politicians who have very definitely arrived at adulthood.

    This situation co-exists uneasily with a lot of lip-service paid to the need for adequate female representation in South African politics. The ANC has had a policy of 50-50 gender parity since Polokwane, but the head of its own Women’s League says South Africa is not ready to have a female president. The DA eschews quotas on principle. While it has prominent female representation at the top in the form of Zille, Mazibuko and Cape Town Mayor, Patricia de Lille, it’s worth noting that only three women head the provincial party lists recently revealed by the DA.

    Into this landscape strode one Mamphela Ramphele last year, announci

      Mamphela ramphele helen zille biography
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  • Helen Zille of South Africa's Democratic Alliance - a profile

    Later, Ms Zille worked for the Black Sash, a civil rights group which the late Nelson Mandela once described as the "conscience of white South Africa" during the apartheid era.

    When apartheid collapsed following the unbanning of the ANC and other liberation movements in 1990, Ms Zille - a married mother of two - joined the tiny Democratic Party (DP), which mostly represented South Africa's English-speaking white liberals.

    It later rebranded itself as the DA, incorporating many Afrikaners who threw their weight behind it after it vowed to "Fight Back" against their erstwhile enemy, the ANC, in the 1999 election campaign.

    Ms Zille became DA leader in 2007, fuelling hopes in party ranks that as a former anti-apartheid activist fluent in Xhosa, one of the main indigenous languages, she would rebrand the party and win over many black voters.

    But recent opinion polls by Ipsos put the DA support among black voters at just 6%.

    "If it holds onto that [percentage in the election], or secures a touch more, it would represent about 4% growth among black voters since 2009. Back to the drawing board," Mr Van Onselen said.

    Ms Zille is the premier of Western Cape - the only province the ANC did not win in 2009. A majority of the province's residents are coloured, or mixed-race, and they form a key DA constituency.

    To broaden the DA's appeal, Ms Zille has elevated black people to top posts in the party - including Lindiwe Mazibuko as parliamentary leader and Mmusi Maimane as its national spokesman and premier candidate in Gauteng - the province which includes Johannesburg and Pretoria, and which the party is targeting in the 7 May election.

    Speculation is rife in political circles that Ms Zille is fighting her last election as DA leader, and she will back either Ms Mazibuko or Mr Maimane as her successor to signal her determination to end racial polarisat

    Helen Zille

    South African politician (born 1951)

    Otta Helene Maree (néeZille; born 9 March 1951), known as Helen Zille, is a South African politician. She has served as the Chairperson of the Federal Council of the Democratic Alliance since 20 October 2019. From 2009 until 2019, she was the Premier of the Western Cape province for two five-year terms, and a member of the Western Cape Provincial Parliament. She served as Federal Leader of the Democratic Alliance from 2007 to 2015 and as Mayor of Cape Town from 2006 to 2009.

    Zille is a former journalist and anti-apartheid activist and was one of the journalists who exposed the cover-up around the death of Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko while working for the Rand Daily Mail in the late 1970s. She also worked with the Black Sash and other pro-democracy groups during the 1980s. In the political arena, Zille has served in all three tiers of government, as the Western Cape's education MEC (1999–2001), as a Member of Parliament (2004–2006), as Mayor of Cape Town (2006–2009), and as Premier of the Western Cape (2009–2019).

    Zille was selected as World Mayor of the Year in 2008. She was also chosen as Newsmaker of the Year 2006 by the National Press Club in July 2007. Zille speaks English, Afrikaans, Xhosa, and German.

    Following her departure from the premiership in May 2019, she joined the South African Institute of Race Relations as a senior policy fellow in July 2019, though she suspended her fellowship in October 2019. She started her own podcast, Tea with Helen, in August 2019. Zille declared her candidacy for Federal Council Chairperson of the DA in October 2019. She won the election.

    Early life and career

    Early years, education and family

    Helen Zille was born in Hillbrow, Johannesburg, the eldest