The Honour to Serve: Recollections of an Umkhonto Soldier, James Ngculu, New Africa Books, Paperback

THE HONOUR TO SERVE
Recollections of an Umkhonto Soldier

Foreword by Thabo Mbeki

'Reinforced by diligent research the book provides telling insight into the reasons for MKs formation; explains what motivated its cadres and details their training and preparation; provides graphic details of campaigns and operations; illustrates how the strategy and tactics of People's War evolved..." Ronnie Kasrils

The Honour to Serve is both his personal story and a fascinating, painstaking history of those aspects of the ANC’s struggle that formed its context. It is a memoir of his life in exile, accounts of his involvement in ANC's military wing, Umkhonto Wesizwe, recollections of various MK operations in Southern Africa, and military training in Europe and other parts of the world. Above all else, it is a gift of gratitude to his comrades and those organizations to which he gave his fealty: the ANC, the Communist Party, and Umkhonto WeSizwe itself. The Honour to Serve was one of five titles short-listed for the prestigious Sunday Times Alan Paton Award.

As a young man James Kgculu was inspired by the 1976 Soweto Uprising to join Umkhonto we Sizwe in exile in Botswana. He served as Secretary of the Regional Commissariat in Angola, worked in Maputo in the Internal Reconstruction Unit on Maputo and was Assistant Administrator at the Military HQ in Lusaka. He was also one of the founding members of MK Military Intelligence. In 1991 he returned to South Africa after getting a job in the University of Natal's Education Policy Unit. In 1994 he was elected Provincial Secretary of the ANC in the Western Cape, later serving as Provincial Chairperson. In 1998 he was elected to Parliament where he served on the Defence Portfolio and the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. He is also co-author of the book, "Ourselves to Know - Civil-Military Relations, Defence Transformations in Southern Africa".

Publisher: New Africa Books

Author: James Ngculu

Isbn: 9780864867339

pages 271, photographs

Paperback

Genre: History, Military, Memior