Nkosi Sikelel’iAfrica composer, Enoch Sontonga dies

Enoch Mankayi Sontonga, writer and composer of the National Anthem Nkosi Sikelel' IAfrica (God Bless Africa) died at the age of thirty-two. He wrote Nkosi Sikelel' IAfrica eight years before his death, at the age of twenty four. There were initially uncertainties around the exact year of his death, but it was finally established that the exact date was 18 April 1905. Seven years after his death the African National Congress launched his hymn into prominence as an anthem of Black struggle against oppression. Because of vandalisation of Braamfontein cemetery, where Sontonga was buried, the City of Johannesburg invited city officials, archaeologists and historians to locate his grave. Once his grave was identified, Nelson Mandela called for the erection of a memorial to Sontonga on the first post-apartheid Heritage Day. On 18 April 2005 the Johannesburg City Parks planned an event to commemorate his death.