Ben Turok

Background

He was born in Latvia in 1927 and came with his family to South Africa in 1934.

Education

He graduated from the University of Cape Town in 1950.

Career

Returning to South Africa in 1953, he joined the South African Congress of Democrats and in 1955 became its secretary for the Cape western region, acting as a full-time organiser for the Congress of the People. He was the African representative on the Cape Provincial Council. He was arrested in the Treason Trial in 1956 and stood trial until charges against him were withdrawn in 1958.

In 1962 he was convicted under the Explosives Acting and sentenced to three years in prison.

He is currently director of the Institute for African alternatives. This veteran African National Congress Member of Parliament is expected to face disciplinary proceedings by the African National Congress after publicly explaining why he broke party ranks and did not vote for the controversial Protection of Information Bill, aka the Secrecy Bill, on 22 November 2011.

Turok was instrumental in helping draw up the Freedom Charter and also served time in jail under apartheid. - ref iol.co.za 24/11/2011.

Achievements

• He is the father of Neil Turok, one of the world"s leading cosmologists, and founder of the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences in Muizenberg, South Africa.

Politics

He is now on the faculty of London"s Open University, for which he wrote a lengthy study in 1975: "Inequality as State Policy: The South African Case." His writings also include "South Africa: The Search for a Strategy," in The Socialist Register 1973 and a booklet, Strategic Problems in South Africa"s Liberation Struggle: A Critical Analysis (1974).

Membership

Before the unbanning of the African National Congress and the dismantling of apartheid, Turok lived in Barnet in North London and was a member of the British Labour Party.