| James Mpanza House | |
|---|---|
 The Blue Plaque on Mpanza's house | |
 | |
| General information | |
| Type | home |
| Address | Hlatywayo Street |
| Town or city | Johannesburg |
| Country | South Africa |
| Coordinates | 26°13′55″S27°55′42″E / 26.2319°S 27.92832°E |
The James Mpanza House is a simple house in Orlando near Johannesburg, South Africa. James Mpanza was a champion for the rights of black South Africans to have homes. He and his family lived in this house and it was also a place of public meetings and informal courts.
James Mpanza's house is a single-storey brick building on Hlatywayo Street in Orlando, Soweto.
Mpanza had worked at a solicitors' office before he was convicted of fraud and murder. His death sentence was reprieved but until 1925 he was in jail, where he became an unofficial preacher. He was released on parole to mark a visit by Edward, Prince of Wales. [1] He moved in the 1930s to this house, where he founded the Sofasonke Party in 1935 and with a message of "Housing and Shelter for All" he was elected to the Orlando Advisory Board in 1936. He married Julia Mngomezulu in 1939 and they were to have six children.
Mpanza held public meetings at his home in Orlando [2] and in April 1944 he persuaded 8,000 people to go and make a new squatter camp [3] called Sofasonke Township with himself as self declared mayor. By 1946 there were 20,000 people there and Mpanza was organising a police force for the squatters. [1]
Mpanza also operated an informal court at his Orlando home where parents could bring their wayward children. He was known as a man of discipline and he would decide and arrange corporal punishment for the guilty. This was not taking the law entirely into his own hands as if the case was serious then it would be referred to the police. However the later growth of vigilante courts of "makgotla" that were common in Soweto are thought to have been derived from the examples made at Mpanza's house. [1]
Conditions were poor and the death of his son, Dumisani, was thought to be caused by the lack of a medical service. [1] Mpanza had led the land invasion that resulted in the founding of modern Soweto [4] and he was known as 'the father of Soweto'. [3]
He was given an uplifting large civic funeral when he died in 1970 and he was buried in Doornkop cemetery. The "traditional courts" or makgotla that operate today in Soweto are thought to have derived from the "parents courts" that Mpanza operated at his own house. [1] The James Mpanza House where his family lived after his death was given a blue plaque to mark his contribution to the history of South Africa. [2]
Soweto is a township of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for South Western Townships. Formerly a separate municipality, it is now incorporated in the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality and is one of the suburbs of Johannesburg.
Albertina SisuluOMSG was a South African anti-apartheid activist. A member of the African National Congress (ANC), she was the founding co-president of the United Democratic Front. In South Africa, where she was affectionately known as Ma Sisulu, she is often called a mother of the nation.
Orlando Pirates Football Club is a South African professional football club based in Orlando, Soweto that plays in the top-tier system of Football in South Africa known as Betway Premiership. The team plays its home matches at Orlando Stadium in Soweto.
Zolile Hector Pieterson was a South African schoolboy who was shot and killed at the age of 12 during the Soweto uprising, when the police opened fire on black students protesting the enforcement of teaching in Afrikaans, mostly spoken by the white and coloured population in South Africa, as the medium of instruction for all school subjects. The students wanted to learn in their native languages, Xhosa and Zulu. A news photograph by Sam Nzima of the mortally wounded Pieterson being carried by another Soweto resident while his sister ran next to them was published around the world. The anniversary of his death is the designated Youth Day in South Africa.
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Orlando is a township in the urban area of Soweto, South Africa. The township was founded in 1931 and named after Edwin Orlando Leake, mayor of Johannesburg from 1925 to 1926. It is divided in two main areas: Orlando West and Orlando East.
Hastings Ndlovu was a schoolboy who was killed in the Soweto uprising against the apartheid system in South Africa.
The Soweto uprising, also known as the Soweto riots, was a series of demonstrations and protests led by black school children in South Africa during apartheid that began on the morning of 16 June 1976.
Orlando Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Soweto, a township in Johannesburg, in Gauteng province in South Africa. It is the home venue for Orlando Pirates Football Club, a professional soccer team that plays in the Premier Soccer League and owned by the City of Johannesburg.
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James Mpanza was a community leader and social activist in Johannesburg, South Africa, from the mid-1940s until the late 1960s. In 1944 he led the land invasion that resulted in largest housing development and the founding of modern Soweto. Mpanza is known as "the father of Soweto".
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Naledi High School is a government secondary school at 892 Nape Street in Soweto. The school took an important role at the start of the Soweto Uprising in 1976.
Malesela Benjamin Moloise was a South African poet and political activist who came to international attention following his arrest and subsequent execution by the government of South Africa. From Soweto, Moloise worked as an upholsterer before turning to poetry during his time on death row. In 1983, Moloise was arrested for the 1982 murder of Phillipus Selepe, a black security policeman who assisted in capturing three African National Congress (ANC) members. Although he initially confessed to the murder, he later retracted the statement during his trial. Moloise's death sentence sparked national and international outrage and was seen as emblematic of South Africa's brutal crackdown on anti-apartheid activists.
Abu Baker Asvat, also known as Abu Asvat or Abu nicknamed Hurley was a South African medical doctor who practised in Soweto in the 1970s and 1980s. A founding member of Azapo, Asvat was the head of its health secretariat, and involved in initiatives aimed at improving the health of rural black South Africans during Apartheid.
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