Thousands of mourners from across the country attended the category two official state funeral of Mabuza held at the Hoerskool Bergvlam in Mbombela, Mpumalanga province.

Mabuza passed away at the age of 64 in a Johannesburg hospital last week.

 

Members of the public sang and chanted struggle slogans as they paid their last tributes to Mabuza. The stands of the Bergvlam school sports field were painted with the colours of various organisations.

Mabuza served as the premier of Mpumalanga province between 2009 and 2018, before he moved to his national deployment as the Deputy President for both the African National Congress (ANC) and the country.

Many of the mourners shared their stories on how they were helped by the late former Deputy President: “I am here to pay my last respects on his last day. He played a great role across the country, especially here in Mpumalanga. Children benefited from schools, and he also cared for the elderly. He used to give us blankets during winter. He also fixed our roads. We are deeply saddened by his passing.”

“I wanted to say condolences to the family of DD Mabuza. He did a lot of things for Mkhondo. He built us a hoërskool, a boarding school. Now we are happy; we have a boarding school. He did a lot for Mkhondo.”
 

ANC Lejweleputswa Regional Chairperson in the Free State, Xolile Toki, was also part of the mourners.

Toki thanked the Mabuza family for the role he played in the country.

“The ANC today is growing from fonder to fonder, and hence the ANC is busy with the renewal program. It’s on the basis that unity is at the centre, and it is also a hard rock where the ANC was born. Now, we honour Comrade DD, the unifier of the ANC. With what he left, that legacy, we’ll continue with it. Rest in peace, comrade DD, and to the family, we are saying thank you for lending us the Deputy President who really embodies unity and nothing else.”

Matshepo Seedat, who worked as Mabuza’s Spokesperson during his tenure as Deputy President, also shared her experience working with Mabuza.

“When I arrived at the office of the Deputy President, all I knew was what the media had painted him to be, and yet I came to know a completely different man. One who valued people and treated people with dignity. He served the people of South Africa, and what he cared about was that the people experienced that their lives were changed by what we did. As his acting spokesperson, I carried the constitution everywhere I went because he always said, If you are writing a speech for me, base it on the constitution.”

--SABC--