3 April 2008
The South African Communist Party is deeply saddened by the fatal gun attack during the evening of the 1st of April on the Deputy President of PUDEMO, Comrade Gabriel Mkhumane in Nelspruit, Mpumalanga Province.
We wish to extend our heartfelt condolences to his family, friends and the liberation movement PUDEMO for the death of a husband, father and comrade. Dr Mkhumane was married to his Cuban wife Soraida and had two children, the 5 years old Lizwe and Lizo who is barely a month old at the time of this incident.
Comrade Mkhumane fled the Swaziland royal regime to Mozambique in the early 1980's. He was educated in Cuba lived and in South Africa.
Many of our party cadres, who worked and fought side by side with Dr. Mkhumane, will remember him as a modest, but gallant internationalist. He spent years in difficult exile conditions, building a revolutionary liberation movement for the Swazi people, expanding its international contacts and often personally undertaking the most arduous tasks of recruitment, political education, promoting internal organisational unity and people's solidarity.
"Dokotela" as he was known in the SACP was a great ally who helped build and maintain very good fraternal relations between our parties and with the depth of his analyses, always cultivated a strategic focus on the revolutionary tasks. He encouraged the budding of an international solidarity movement for a democratic Swaziland.
The SACP supports a fully comprehensive investigation on this matter, not least to safeguard our hard won gains and victories for the right to life, but to inform the family, friends and oppressed people of Swaziland about the circumstances surrounding the killing of Comrade Mkhumane, including the real possibilities of an extra-territorial assassination by his enemies.
The General Secretary, Comrade Blade Nzimande also expressed the SACP's "deep skepticism of the baffling circumstances relating to Dr. Mkhumane's killing". Whilst it will be well intentioned not to raise alarms though reckless speculations, it is also known that Dr Mkhumane died a sworn arch-enemy of the King Mswati regime and was sharply articulate in conveying the grinding oppression of his people in his final days.
As our symbol of our ongoing solidarity, the SACP would grow extremely apprehensive if all leads are not meticulously followed by our law enforcement agencies as our moral duty to ensure that justice prevails.
We call on Pudemo to highlight the life of Comrade Mkhumane, by intensifying the Swazi liberation struggle, and commit to unflinching solidarity against the royal Tinkhundla regime.
Issued by the SACP
Malesela Maleka
SACP Spokesperson - 082 226 1802