Career
His reign was from the early 1960s to 2006. In 1977, he was elected to Minister of Health and after 1978, when Ciskei became a one-party state, he became the Whip of the CNIP. During his term as Minister of Health he was prominent in the renaming of the Mdantsane Hospital to the Cecilia Makiwane Hospital, to commemorate Cecilia Makiwane, the first Black nurse in South Africa. In 1978 he was a director of CTC Business Company Limited.
The Amakhuze Tribe originated from Zulu land but in 1834 they escaped and went westward to the Transkei to escape the Mfecane under the leadership of their chief, Chief Jama.
Jama settled with Hintsa, the then king of the Xhosa but Mqalo, Jama"s son, split from Jama"s group and crossed the Great Kei River and moved to Portuguese Elizabeth, Fort Beaufort and in 1870 to Makhuzeni Location, Alice in the Tyume River valley.
The area has become their tribal area and is still called this. During their migration, migrants of other clans and tribes joined them in their search for a place to settle.
This migration followed the expulsion of the Ngqika under paramount Chief Sandile after the 1850-1853 Frontier War. The British cleared the Tyume valley of Xhosa who had settled there before Upon arrival, Chief Mqalo began to allocate land to different groups in different parts of the landscape which explains the occurrence of the villages: Gilton, Guquka, Sompondo and Mpundu, Kwezana et cetera
Genealogy
The Mqalo family tree:.
