ABSTRACT
It was right ukuhamba ngiye e Tanzania because now I am very happy that I contributed in uplifting health services zakwamanye amazwe e Africa. I am very happy that I managed ukuba ngifunde ibehaviour zabantu kwamanye amazwe. It was also a contribution to our struggle for liberation. Again, nokubuyisa our organisation’s (ANC) morale even though abantu bakithi be oppressed bayabona ukuthi banalo usizo kwabanye abantu akusho ukuthi they are useless. . . . 1
Early in December 1961 before the official proclamation concerning the armed struggle and the existence of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the military wing of the African National Congress, a group of 21[20?] African nurses left South Africa into exile. This was before the first large contingent of MK cadres went into exile in 1962. These nurses were recruited by the ANC from the Cape, Natal and Transvaal provinces. The names of these nurses are as follow:
1. Edith Ncwana
2. Finess Luke
3. Sinah Jali
4. Edith Thunyiswa
5. Kholeka Thunyiswa
6. Edna Mgabaza
7. Mary Mwandla
8. Celia Khuzwayo
9. Nicolene
10. Georginah Masusu
11. Gertrude Nzimande
12. Mavis Motha
13. Mary Jane Socenywa
14. Natalie Msimang
15. Hilda Bonqo
16. Victoria Magodla
17. Moni de Swardze (Dutch/Scandinavian husband surname)
18. Nosipho Mshumpela
19. Neo Raditladi
20. Edna Miya
Unsung heroines as the twenty nurses were, and still are, they were members of a colonized indigenous society whose silent workers nobly raised, nursed, cared for and mothered the gamut of the white population in South Africa. Popular history finds it easier to record the story of the main actor and dominant race in racist societies such as South Africa, and sadly ignores the compelling story of the ordinary people and the subjugated, whose stories are equally valuable in human experience and history. In 20th century history and literature, there was a move towards social history as represented by the downtrodden; these writings consciously aimed at focusing on plebeians and the oppressed, instead of kings, thanes, chiefs, dukes and earls. I am continuing with this tradition by focusing and foregrounding my paper on freedom fighters-in this instance represented by ordinary African women who were part of the Pan African struggle for liberation. But one can also argue that these heroines were not necessarily ordinary because their role in the Pan African struggles for liberation was extra-ordinary.
