Dr. Yusuf Mohamed Dadoo

Date: 5 September, 1909

On 5 September 1909, a tireless fighter for national and social liberation, Dr. Yusuf Mohamed Dadoo was born in Krugersdorp, Johannesburg. According to Essop Pahad, the story of Dadoo’s life was inextricably linked to the resistance of racial discrimination and apartheid. Dadoo was known by many for always forging closer links between underprivileged groups of Indian, African and Coloured people in the struggle for liberation. His family arrived in South Africa in the 1890s, three decades after the first group of Indian immigrant labours entered South Africa.

He left an impressive political legacy, covering a number of fields spanning the relationship between transnational identity, racial identity, national liberation, socialism, non-racialism and internationalism. On 19 September 1983, Dadoo died while in exile in London.

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References:

1. Pahad, E., 1979 ‘Yusuf Mohamed Dadoo’from The African Communist, No. 78 [online].  Available at: www.sacp.org.za [Accessed 19 July 2011] 
2. South African History Online, 2011 ‘Dr. Yusuf Mohamed Dadoo’ [online] Available at www.sahistory.org.za [Accessed: 19 July 2011] 
3. Verwey, E. J. (ed.), 1995. “Dadoo, Yusuf Mohamed (Mota)” in New dictionary of South African Biography,Vol. 1. Pretoria: HSRC Press.