Elias Moretsele

Elias Phakane Moretsele was born in Sekhukhune in 1897. There isn't a lot of information pertaining to his youth. At an early age he moved to Johannesburg where he joined the SANNC in 1917. He was the owner of an eating-house in the city. This venue became a popular meeting place for African politicians.

In 1933, he was a committee member of the then-Bapedi National Club in Johannesburg. The club was non-political and was established so that its members could help one another and provide social upliftment. This underscored Moretsele’s commitment to and love for his tribe of origin, the Pedi of the North-Eastern Transvaal, which characterised his entire public career.

In 1943, Moretsele’s leadership role in the ANC only began after the drastic reorganisation of the Transvaal ANC when he was elected to their working committee. He also became the provincial treasurer of the ANC in the Transvaal. In August 1946, during the black mineworkers’ strike, he was involved in liaison between the ANC and strike leaders. In October 1953, at the annual congress of the Transvaal ANC at Sophiatown, he was unanimously elected provincial president. A month previously, he had been appointed as acting president by the Transvaal executive committee because Nelson Mandela, by virtue of the Suppression of Communism Act, had been one of those ordered to relinquish the office in question.

Shortly after Moretsele’s election as ANC president of the Transvaal, he became officially and personally involved in various quarrels. The first was a clash in the Newclare branch between supporters and opponents of the ANC’s alliance with organisations of other races. The second was about his successful participation at the end of 1953 in the election of members of the Native Advisory Committee of the Western Native Town in Johannesburg where he became a candidate for the local ‘Vigilance Committee’ (also called the Blue Party). His involvement with that committee brought considerable criticism down upon his head. The third was the dispute between supporters and opponents of school boycotts as a weapon of resistance against the implementation of the Bantu Education Act in 1955.

Moretsele was a fiery supporter of school boycotts. However, after a large number of children were permanently suspended, many parents and ANC leaders – to his dissatisfaction – directed a representation to the government to have the children readmitted. By 1955, Moretsele was also a member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC. He was involved in arranging and attending meetings of the Congress of the People, where he officially welcomed all the delegates. Thereafter, he continually defended the Freedom Charter against the Africanists who rejected its multiracial basis. At the time, especially within the ANC in Johannesburg’s western areas, there was bitter disagreement about the Freedom Charter.

On 25 February 1958, two days after a chaotic provincial conference of the Transvaal ANC, during which the executive could not satisfactorily counter charges against them, Moretsele resigned as president of the Transvaal ANC. He did not, however, withdraw from politics. Not only was he again elected as provincial treasurer of the Transvaal ANC later in 1958, but he regularly visited the unrest-afflicted areas of Sekhukhuneland to help keep the flame of rebelliousness against apartheid burning. 

In 1956 Moretsele was one of the 156 accused who were tried during the famous treason trial. He was in fact one of the last 30 accused held until the end of the trial, but died early in March 1961, three weeks before the acquittal of all the accused.