Nzo, Alfred (1925-2000), served as South Africa’s minister of foreign affairs from 1994 to 1999. Nzo was born in Benoni, Gauteng, South Africa, on June 19, 1925. He was educated in the Eastern Cape. In 1950, he became a member of the African National Congress (ANC), a largely Black group that opposed the minority white population’s rule of South Africa. He was imprisoned many times by the government and left South Africa in 1964. He became an ANC representative first in Egypt and then in India. For 22 years, from 1969, he was secretary general of the ANC and was also a member of the South African Communist Party. After he returned from exile in 1991, Nzo took part in talks between the ANC and the South African government. Nzo died on Jan. 13, 2000.
