Sicelo Shiceka

Sicelo Shiceka (8 June 1966 – 30 April 2012) was a South African politician who served as Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs from May 2009 until his death in April 2012. Before that, he was the Minister of Provincial and Local Government from September 2008 and May 2009. Throughout his service in the cabinet, he represented the African National Congress (ANC) in the National Assembly.

Born in rural Eastern Cape, Shiceka entered politics as an anti-apartheid activist in Johannesburg and Soweto. After the end of apartheid in 1994, he represented the ANC in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature from 1994 to 2004 and in the National Council of Provinces from 2004 to 2008. A political ally to Jacob Zuma, he was elected to the ANC's National Executive Committee in December 2007.

Shiceka was born on 8 June 1966 in Ingquza Hill, a village near Flagstaff in the former Cape Province (present-day Eastern Cape). His father died before he was born, and his mother, a nurse, moved to Johannesburg to find work while he was still an infant. He grew up with extended family in Ingquza Hill, attending Mhlanga Primary School in nearby Lusikisiki. In 1979, he joined his mother in Johannesburg and enrolled at Jabulani Junior Secondary School in Soweto. However, he matriculated at the Inanda High School in Durban, where he lived with his sister.

In later years he completed a diploma in economics at the Wharton School in Pennsylvania, United States and a diploma in labour relations at Witwatersrand University. He also studied towards, but did not complete, a master's degree in political economy at the University of the Free State; the degree was falsely listed on his official résumé until 2010.

Shiceka's political influences included his grandfather and uncle, who were both anti-apartheid activists; the former died in exile after participating in the 1960 Pondo revolt, and the latter died in exile after joining Umkhonto we Sizwe. Shiceka himself became active in anti-apartheid politics as a high school student in Soweto, and he was elected as chairperson of the Soweto branch of the Congress of South African Students in 1980.

When he returned to Soweto after high school, he resumed his political activity, becoming a leading figure in the Azanian Students' Organisation, an affiliate of the Azanian People's Organisation (AZAPO). In 1987 he was shot and badly wounded in an apparent assassination attempt. In 1989 he joined the burgeoning trade union movement, recruited as an organiser for the Paper, Printing, Wood and Allied Workers' Union, an affiliate of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU). He was elected as the union's provincial secretary in PWV the following year.

As political restrictions were lifted during the negotiations to end apartheid, Shiceka became overtly involved in structures of the Tripartite Alliance. From 1991, he chaired a branch of the South African Communist Party in downtown Johannesburg; from 1992 he was provincial secretary of COSATU; and from 1993 he was deputy chairperson of the Kyalami regional branch of the African National Congress (ANC).

In South Africa's first post-apartheid elections in April 1994, Shiceka was elected to represent the ANC in the newly established Gauteng Provincial Legislature. Gauteng Premier Tokyo Sexwale also appointed him to the Gauteng Executive Council as Member of the Executive Council (MEC) for Development Planning and Local Government. He served a full five-year term in that position. During that time, in 1996, he was elected for the first time to the ANC's Provincial Executive Committee.