Defend Truth

Father Smangaliso Mkhatshwa

Father Smangaliso Mkhatshwa is chairman of the Moral Regeneration Movement (MRM) and an ordained Catholic priest. He was detained for four months after the 1976 student uprisings and subsequently banned for five years by the apartheid government. Mkhatshwa served as general-secretary of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference during the 1980s and played a key role in the formation of the National Education Crisis Committee and the United Democratic Front, where he was appointed as patron. He also played a crucial role in the establishment of the New Age newspaper in the late 1980s. He headed the Institute for Contextual Theology, which pioneered understanding of liberation theology in South Africa, from 1988 until 1994, when he was elected an ANC MP. In 1996 became the Deputy Minister of Education, a post he held until 1999. In 2000 he was elected Executive Mayor of the City of Tshwane. Mkhatshwa holds an MA in philosophy and theology from the University of Leuven in Belgium, and three honorary doctorates in philosophy.