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An Overview of the African National Congress Archives at the University of Fort Hare

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

T.J. Stapleton  and
M. Maamoe
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Extract

Located in the small town of Alice in South Africa's Eastern Cape Province, the University of Fort Hare (UFH) was established in 1916 and for many years was the only institution of higher education in sub-equatorial Africa which was open to black students. Therefore, among Fort Hare's alumni are well-known African nationalists and politicians such as Oliver Tambo and Govan Mbeki of the African National Congress (ANC); Robert Sobukwe, who founded the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC); Mangosuthu Buthelezi of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP); Eluid Mathu, who was the first African member of the Kenya Legislative Council,;President Robert Mugabe and Herbert Chitepo of Zimbabwe; Prime Minister Ntsu Mokhehle of Lesotho; former Prime Minister Fwanyanga Mulikita of Uganda; and many others. While Fort Hare was taken over by the apartheid government in 1959 and incorporated into a network of ethnic universities within the homeland system, from the 1960s to early 1990s various banned liberation movements were active on campus and students periodically clashed with security forces. As a result, “[i]t is thus not surprising that with its venerable history of resistance and struggle, the UFH was chosen to be the repository of most of the archives of the Liberation Front.”

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 25 , 1998 , pp. 413 - 422
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1998

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References

1 Tau, M.N., “Proposal to House the Liberation Movements Archives in a New Extension of the Library Building at the University of Fort Hare,” UFH document, September 1996, 1.Google Scholar

2 Professor Mbulelo Mzamane, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Fort Hare and a well-known novelist, is currently editing a selection of Oliver Tambo's speeches for publication.

3 Maaba, L.B., “Student Activities and Conduct at Solomon Mahlangu College, 1978-92,” BA Honours Dissertation, University of Fort Hare, 1996.Google Scholar Sean Morrow, Loyiso Pulumani, and L.B. Maaba, all of Fort Hare's Govan Mbeki Research Resource Centre, are currently working on a popular history of SOMAFCO that utilizes both the archival collection and oral sources.

4 Many thanks to Robert Kukubo, archivist of Fort Hare's Centre for Cultural Studies, for this information.