Cape Town - Tributes continue to pour in following the passing of educator and activist, Allan Liebenberg, who spent most of his life fighting and working towards the betterment of those around him, particularly those more vulnerable.
LLiebenberg died after 1pm on Saturday at the Trianon Care Centre, two days after a three-week stay at Constantia Mediclinic where he had been receiving treatment for cancer.
He was 67 years old. Liebenberg was diagnosed with metastatic squamous carcinoma of the tonsil in June 2021. His children Lewin, Lenine, and Ben said: “He was a staunch proponent of justice and ethics – and it wasn’t just theoretical, he did the work.
“He was regularly in and out of courts fighting for what he believed in. Even when prone in the hospital, my father was still looking out for the rights of others: ‘I hope they're paying these porters and nurses well. They do so much, and they’re excellent’.”
They said their father did not want a funeral service or burial site.
“An atheist, he believed that his death was his end.
“He wanted no funeral, burial, gravestone, or memorial. Instead, he wanted his ashes scattered by his family on the mountain he loved.
“We will honour him this way and celebrate his memory and teachings through our actions,” his children said.
In a tribute, his brother Donald Neumann said Liebenberg, who grew up in Lansdowne and attended Livingstone High School, became politically awakened following the murder of Imam Abdullah Haron in detention in 1969. As the Student Representative Council (SRC) chairperson, he led many student demonstrations against the apartheid government.
Neumann said Liebenberg was routinely harassed and would receive lashes from the security police at school and be detained.
Liebenberg studied Education at the University of the Western Cape and was elected as SRC chairperson during his first year. Neumann said as a teacher at Parkwood High School, Liebenberg was routinely dismissed by the Department of Coloured Affairs and detained until 1990.
He later went on to become the principal of Crestway High School in the late 1990s and started the Western Cape Governing Body Association serving predominantly marginalised schools. He also served at various levels of the Western Province Senior Schools Sports Union (WPSSSU).
Liebenberg’s nephew, Wesley Neumann, said his uncle’s studies were always interrupted by detention without trial. In 1976, he was detained under Section 29 of the Communist Act and spent 90 days in solitary confinement.
“Other than shorter detention of about 14 days, he was detained in 1980 and 1985 for periods extending 90 days.”
Former Trafalgar High principal, Nadeem Hendricks, said to his very last, Liebenberg displayed an undying quench for justice for the farming and urban poor.