On 6 July, we received the sad news that Aunty Blanche La Guma (1927-2023) was no more. Aunty Blanche was born on the Cape Flats and rose to become a midwife and a political leader who opposed apartheid and who dreamt and fought for the eradication of poverty. Her passion for justice would take her to far flung places around the world with her husband, Alex La Guma – who later became an internationally acclaimed novelist, and a representative of the ANC stationed in Havana, Cuba.

Aunty Blanche was born prematurely into humble beginnings in Gleemoor, Athlone and was the fifth and last child of her parents, Peter, and Sophia Herman. Although physically frail at birth, Aunty Blanche would lead a full and tumultuous life into her 96th year.

Aunty Blanche’s mother, Sophia had a profound effect on her daughter and influenced her participation in community and political activities:

[My mother] worked as a domestic to augment my father’s [meagre] income, washing and ironing and cleaning houses for white women. Most of the white madams were terrible [and paid low wages] … It was by watching her [my mother] struggle to make ends meet that I developed my attitude against the exploitation of one human being by another.

More importantly, Sophia was a member of the St John Brigade Ambulance and administered first-aid in the community.

Aunty Blanche’s father, Peter worked in the printing industry and experienced bouts of unemployment. Although the family struggled financially to make ends meet, she points out that, “Morally my parents were so strong that they overcame their financial difficulties. We were poor, but we never felt poor.”

In her younger days, Aunty Blanche had been a pillar of her community and, as a midwife, had delivered many babies to poor families on the Cape Flats, often without any pay.

In the introduction to her autobiography, In the Dark with my Dress on Fire: My Life in Cape Town, London, Havana and Home Again she recalled delivering a baby on a cold night in a pondokkie in Rylands with the aid of two candles. Rainwater from a Cape storm fell through the leaking roof and snuffed out the candle in front of her and she was left with one lit candle behind her. She described what happened:

"Suddenly I was working almost completely in the dark… Just as I was ready to bring the rest of the baby through, I began to feel an intense heat on my bottom. The candle behind me had set my uniform on fire! I could feel I was burning a bit, but before I put out the flame, I had to finish the delivery. There I was — in the rain, in the dark, with my dress on fire — delivering a baby!"

Aunty Blanche managed to deliver the baby safely whilst extinguishing the fire on her dress. This incident epitomized the strength of her character and the many challenges and obstacles she faced and conquered in her life.

She had financially supported her family for long periods of time when her husband Alex La Guma was either not allowed to work outside the home by the Nationalist government, or when he often worked without payment for the ANC in exile.

Aunty Blanche and Alex La Guma were organisers for the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA) - which later became the South African Communist Party (SACP) - and the Coloured People’s Congress (CPC).

Aunty Blanche had organised nurses to protest against then-proposed apartheid legislation in the nursing profession. She and her husband had been on trial (separately, he was a Treason Trialist), banned, prosecuted, persecuted, and ultimately exiled, in 1966. Alex La Guma died of a heart attack in Cuba in 1985 and Aunty Blanche returned to Cape Town in 1994, where she lived until her death.

And through all this, Aunty Blanche never lost her passion for justice. Neither did she lose her critical voice. She defied the apartheid government and later the SACP and the ANC. She steadfastly believed in doing the right thing. Her integrity was impeccable. She never hesitated to voice her opinions on crucial personal and political matters.

When her son, Eugene was preparing to marry a Russian woman, Lena Chelnikov, members of the SACP wanted Aunty Blanche to stop the marriage, claiming that, ‘The Russians don’t like their people, especially their women, to marry foreigners.’ Aunty Blanche and Alex La Guma never caved in under pressure from the SACP and their son married his Russian bride.

Aunty Blanche is the only woman from exile - I know of - that has broached, in print, the allegations of sexual abuse incidents committed by some ANC men against some ANC women in exile. The ANC-government (and the SACP) has not made a fuss of her passing - issuing a statement only five days after her death - although she and her husband had served the organisation well. It may be in part because of Aunty Blanche’s defiance in 1986 of an offer for her to relocate to Lusaka, Zambia after her husband’s death. She describes her reasons for not accepting the ANC’s offer:

"About this time I was also offered a position in the ANC at headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia. I turned it down, because whilst I was in Havana I’d heard from one of the ANC women attending school in Cuba…that the women in Lusaka were being harassed — in fact, raped. Other people who had been there confirmed what she said."

Aunty Blanche’s refusal to do as ordered by both the ANC and the SACP seems to have soured her relationship with both organisations and its leaders. I imagine the ANC leadership was also not thrilled at Aunty Blanche’s book broaching the allegations of the sexual abuse and exploitation of some women by some men, within the ANC ranks in exile.

I visited Aunty Blanche several times between 2019 and 2020; we would share a meal and have long chats. Aunty Blanche knew my partner, James April from the early 1960s, when they had both served on the executive of the CPC. James had also been detained in the same cell with Alex La Guma in Roeland Street prison in 1963. In her book, Aunty Blanche wrote:

James April was one of two young Coloured men from Cape Town who were almost like sons to Alex. The other one was Basil February. The two were political twins. They were young intellectuals of the Unity Movement whom we first met in the early 1960s. James and Basil would have heated debates with Alex into the early hours of the morning.

It was because of knowing James, that Aunty Blanche trusted me and welcomed me into her home. We lived about three blocks from her. I visited her one Sunday afternoon. As I entered her apartment, she pointed to the Sunday newspaper lying on her couch and voiced her disdain for the latest ANC-government corruption scandal.

That afternoon we paged through her photographs which she gave me permission to scan and use. I fell in love with Aunty Blanche’s wedding photographs. What a stunning and radiant bride she made. She was so in love with her husband. The photographs tell it all. With each photograph Aunty Blanche sketched a context and told me a few anecdotes. She showed me photographs of their stays in London, the German Democratic Republic (GDR), and then Havana, where Alex La Guma was the ANC representative for Latin America and Caribbean countries. They had also visited India, and Moscow amongst other places. There was so much joy and laughter when she spoke of her beloved husband and their two sons, Eugene and Barto.

Aunty Blanche was no ordinary woman. She was spirited. She was fearless. She was direct. She was independent and a no-nonsense person. The kind of woman the current ANC leadership would view as ‘undesirable and inconvenient’ in its ranks.

But, the contribution made by Aunty Blanche and Alex La Guma to the struggle for freedom has not been forgotten by the people of Cape Town. In April 2022, Artscape hosted a theatre performance called, Dance of the La Gumas: a story of Revolution, Rumba and Romance, which captured their love story. Aunty Blanche attended the premiere of the show.

In my chats with Aunty Blanche, it seemed a huge part of her heart and soul died when her cherished husband passed away. She said of Alex La Guma, ‘He was my mentor, my lover, my everything’. The Aunty Blanche I used to visit for chats is lonely no more. She has joined her beloved and he is strumming his guitar and singing ballads and love songs just for her, as he always did. He is serenading her as usual with a popular song called, ‘Lily of Laguna’.

Aunty Blanche was a woman who had lived ahead of her time.

Go well Aunty Blanche. You will never be forgotten!

Notes:

1. When I grew up in District Six and on the Cape Flats we referred to older women as ‘aunty’ even though there was no blood relationship. It was a sign of respect.

2. Blanche La Guma passed on 6 July 2023 at the age of 95.

3. In 1969 he won the Lotus Prize for Literature.

4. La Guma, B. Jacana Media, Cape Town, 2010 p.5

5. Ibid. p.17

6. Ibid. p.7

7. La Guma, B. Jacana Media, Cape Town, 2010 p. vi

8. Ibid

9. Ibid. p132

10. This was the first of its kind protest by nurses in Cape Town. The proposed Bill in summary aimed to introduce Apartheid into nursing and inter alia meant separate registers for ‘Non-European’ nurses, different uniforms and insignia and most importantly different standards of training. This was supported by the Afrikaaans Nurses’ League which claimed that ‘centuries of tradition and culture and civilization’ determined the European nurses ‘superior status’. See La Guma B. pp59-63

11. La Guma, B. Jacana Media, Cape Town, 2010 p.161

12. The Friends of Cuba Society held a celebration of Blanche La Guma’s spirit on 22 July.

13. Ibid. p.199

14. Others detained in the same cell included Hennie Ferris and members of the Yu Chi Chan Club, later know as the National Liberation Front.

15. Ibid. p155

16. Ibid. p188

17. Aunty Blanche recounts how Alex would always serenade her. See La Guma, B. Jacana Media, Cape Town, 2010 p.42