Anti-apartheid activist Nokuthula Simelane receives Order of Luthuli

JOHANNESBURG - Several anti-apartheid activists have been honoured during this year’s national orders’ ceremony, among them Nokuthula Simelane.

The uMkhonto weSizwe operative disappeared from an underground parking lot at Carlton Centre in downtown Johannesburg in September 1983.

She had gone there to meet a man she believed was a comrade but was, instead an undercover member of the security police.

At the meeting, Simelane was thrown into a police vehicle never to be seen again.

She has now been awarded the Order of Luthuli, for “incredible bravery”.

President Cyril Ramaphosa mentioned her in his address at the presentation of the national orders on Tuesday.

"Several of the recipients of this year’s Order of Luthuli were brutally killed by the apartheid regime. One of them is Ms Nokuthula Simelane, who was abducted and tortured by the apartheid security branch. Her remains were never found."

Ramaphosa describes Simelane’s disappearance as “a wound that will never heal for her family”.

"Like the scars of many other South Africans whose loved ones disappeared during the repressive years of apartheid. By honouring those fallen heroes with national orders we are saying that no matter how great the passage of time, they have not been forgotten."