African National Congress veteran Walter Sisulu, born in 1912, the year the ANC was founded, has died, the ANC said on Monday.
He was to turn 91 this month.
"You, Walter, are indeed like a miracle that God has made."
These were the words of President Thabo Mbeki, quoting from An African Elegy written by Nigerian poet Ben Okri, paying tribute to Sisulu at his 90th birthday celebrations in May, 2002.
Former president Nelson Mandela at the same ceremony saluted him for the life-long work he did for the ANC.
"Walter Sisulu is a humble and selfless leader who taught us that wisdom comes from sharing insight," Mandela said.
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He came to Johannesburg from Engcobo, Transkei in 1929.
He was only able to attend school until Standard Four (Grade Six) after which he studied on his own to improve his education.
Sisulu became a mineworker in Johannesburg, working a mile underground in arduous and dangerous conditions, sleeping in the grim barracks in one of the Reef compounds.
His next job was in East London as a "kitchen boy".
He then returned to Johannesburg to work in a bakery for 18 shillings a week.
He picked up some information about trade unions and ended up leading his fellow workers on a strike for higher wages. The strike was defeated and he was fired.
Sisulu joined the ANC in 1940 and was among the group of radicals who formed the Youth League in 1943 to 1944.
The organisation's leadership had, in the late 1920s, split over whether to co-operate with the Communist Party, and the ensuing victory of the conservatives within the ANC left the party small and disorganised through the 1930s.
In the 1940s the ANC revived under younger leaders who pressed for a more militant stance against colour bars in South Africa.
The ANC Youth League attracted Sisulu, Oliver Tambo, and Nelson Mandela, who in turn displaced the party's moderate leadership in 1949 at what many view as the party's watershed conference.
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