(GIN) – One time ANC military Denis Goldberg was one of Nelson Mandela’s two co-defendants from the 1963-64 Rivonia trial at which 10 men were on trial for their lives for conspiring to overthrow the apartheid regime by force.
Goldberg was sentenced to life imprisonment alongside Mandela for the crime of sabotage, serving 22 years at Pretoria Central prison, rather than Robben Island because of his color.
He was a mainstay of the ANC’s military operation in Cape Town, obtaining bomb ingredients and instructing recruits on how to handle them. After the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, he was recruited by Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the ANC, and took part in its campaign of sabotage against installations and rose to run its first military training camp.
He fought against corruption but for years only within the ANC. Eventually, on a visit to London in 2016 to receive the freedom of the City of London, he publicly called on the Zuma government to resign.
His last campaign was to create the House of Hope, an arts and educational center in Hout Bay for deprived children, to which he left his collection of vibrant African art.
He died at his home near Cape Town. He was 87.
