{{Short description|South African politician and anti-apartheid activist (1936–1999)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2023}} {{Infobox officeholder | party = African National Congress (since 1999) | office1 = Member of the National Assembly | term_start1 = May 1994 | term_end1 = June 1999 | birth_date = {{birth date|1936|05|29|df=yes}} | birth_name = Ahmed Gora Ebrahim | death_date = {{death date and age|1999|11|25|1936|05|29|df=yes}} | birth_place = Durban, Natal Province<br />Union of South Africa | death_place = Berea, Gauteng<br />Republic of South Africa | other_party = Pan Africanist Congress (1957–1999) | relations = Ebrahim Ebrahim (brother) }}
'''Ahmed Gora Ebrahim''' (29 May 1936 – 25 November 1999) was a South African politician and former anti-apartheid activist. He was the foreign secretary of the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) during apartheid and represented the party in the National Assembly from 1994 to 1999. Shortly after losing his parliamentary seat in June 1999, and shortly before his death in November that year, he defected to the African National Congress (ANC).
== Early life and anti-apartheid activism == Ebrahim was born on 29 May 1936 in Durban in the former Natal province.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web |date=25 October 2013 |title=Ahmed Gora Ebrahim |url=https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/ahmed-gora-ebrahim |access-date=2023-05-29 |website=South African History Online}}</ref> He and his younger brother, Ebrahim Ismail, were both politically active in their youth, in his case in Trotskyite circles at Natal University and the University of the Witwatersrand.<ref name=":1" /> However, while his brother joined the ANC,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Williams |first=Christopher |date=2023-01-05 |title=Beyond Fear: By Ebrahim Ebrahim. Johannesburg: Jacana, 2022. xi + 300 pp. ISBN 978 1 4314 3232 5. |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02582473.2022.2157472 |journal=South African Historical Journal |language=en |pages=1–3 |doi=10.1080/02582473.2022.2157472 |s2cid=255723457 |issn=0258-2473|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Orkin |first=Mark |date=1992 |title='Democracy Knows No Colour': Rationales for Guerrilla Involvement among Black South Africans |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2637303 |journal=Journal of Southern African Studies |volume=18 |issue=3 |pages=642–669 |doi=10.1080/03057079208708330 |jstor=2637303 |issn=0305-7070|url-access=subscription }}</ref> he joined the PAC in 1957 and went into exile in 1963 after the party was banned.<ref name=":1" />
Over the next three decades, Ebrahim was a prominent representative of the PAC abroad, at different times serving as its chief representative in Egypt, in Iraq, in China, in Zimbabwe, and at the United Nations in New York. In 1969, based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, he was appointed as the PAC's secretary for foreign affairs.<ref name=":1" /> He was also a founding member of the South African Non Racial Olympic Committee and served as its acting president when Dennis Brutus was detained, and during his five years in Iraq, he was editor of the ''Baghdad Observer''.<ref name=":1" /> He returned to South Africa in 1990, after the PAC was unbanned by the apartheid government, and he was a member of the PAC's delegation to the negotiations that ended apartheid.<ref name=":1" />
== Post-apartheid political career == In South Africa's first post-apartheid elections in 1994, Ebrahim was elected to represent the PAC in the National Assembly.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |url=https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/read/13429370/south-africa-campaign-and-election-report-april-26- |title=South Africa: Campaign and Election Report April 26–29, 1994 |publisher=International Republican Institute |year=1994 |access-date=13 April 2023 |via=Yumpu}}</ref> After a single term in the assembly, he lost his seat in the 1999 general election, in which the PAC performed poorly. In the aftermath of the election, media reports suggested that Ebrahim was on the brink of defecting from the PAC to the ANC, which had apparently offered him a diplomat post;<ref>{{Cite web |date=1999-06-17 |title=PAC leadership erosion begins |url=https://mg.co.za/article/1999-06-17-pac-leadership-erosion-begins/ |access-date=2023-05-29 |website=The Mail & Guardian |language=en-ZA}}</ref> he defected soon afterwards.<ref name=":2">{{Cite news |date=26 November 1999 |title=Ex-PAC leader Gora Ebrahim dies |work=Sowetan |url=https://allafrica.com/stories/199911260117.html |access-date=29 May 2023}}</ref>
== Personal life and death == Ebrahim met his French wife, Xaviere, in China, where she worked as a translator. They had two children, a son and a daughter, who were born in exile in Tanzania.<ref name=":1" />
Months after joining the ANC, Ebrahim died on 25 November 1999 at his home in Berea, Johannesburg after suffering a heart attack.<ref name=":2" />
== References == {{Reflist}}
== External links ==
* [https://nai.uu.se/library/resources/liberation-africa/interviews/gora-ebrahim.html Interview with Gora Ebrahim by Tor Sellström within the project Nordic Documentation on the Liberation Struggle in Southern Africa] - dated 22 July 1995
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ebrahim, Gora}} Category:1936 births Category:1999 deaths Category:Activists from Durban Category:Politicians from Durban Category:South African politicians of Indian descent Category:South African people of Gujarati descent Category:Politicians from KwaZulu-Natal Category:South African anti-apartheid activists Category:Pan Africanist Congress of Azania politicians Category:Members of the National Assembly of South Africa 1994–1999