Cape Town - The sounds of Struggle songs and ululations filled Mew Way Hall in Khayelitsha as the community and political leaders celebrated the life of former politician and activist-turned-businessman Loyiso Nkohla, who died in a hail of bullets last week.
Family members, leaders from different political parties, and other speakers took turns in commemorating the life of Nkohla as an activist and champion of informal settlements.
ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula and academic and businesswoman Mamphela Ramphele were some of the dignitaries that attended Nkohla’s memorial service.
Nkohla, 40, was a City councillor and moved to join other political formations including the Land Party and the DA before championing the Ses’khona People’s Rights movement, where he used the platform to fight for the rights of those in informal settlements.
It was through this movement that he and other community leaders in 2013 led a protest at Cape Town International Airport and the provincial legislature to protest against Khayelitsha residents’ inadequate sanitation and threw human faeces on its steps.
Nkohla had since left politics and was a businessman, with businesses in construction and meat distribution. He also had a contract with Prasa for cleaning the Central Line, currently occupied by squatters.
At the time of his death, Nkohla was working with the Langa and Philippi residents who invaded the Central line to ensure that they were relocated.
Vuyo Nkohla, his brother, said it was a difficult time for the family to process the untimely death of their son. Vuyo said Loyiso was known all over the city and had impacted the lives of those marginalised from Khayelitsha and Dunoon to Kraaifontein.
Dr Mamphela Ramphele said it was wrong to label Nkohla as a “poo” man. Ramphele said Nkohla was gifted to the nation to be “conscious” in a country that had lost its way.
“Loyiso became uncomfortable with the huge inequities around us. He asked questions that seniors were too afraid to ask. He saw the power in those who were discarded and marginalised and inspired those in the margins of society to rise to that power in them and occupy their space.
“He knew that we cannot be a free country for as long as this betrayal of a liberated South Africa continues. He wept when he saw humiliated blacks living with the indignity of sharing buckets and so-called ‘porter porter’ toilets in the City that prides itself as the fairest of the Cape,” she said.
Mbalula said Nkohla was a trusted servant of the people. He called on the police to ensure that they left no stone unturned in bringing the perpetrators “who did not conceal their identities” to book.
