Anti-Apartheid fighter and South African Communist Party member. Slovo was born Yossel Mashel Slovo in Obelai, Lithuania. His family left Europe for South Africa in 1935 amid the rising climate of antisemitism. In 1941, rising poverty forced Slovo to leave school early, and he joined the Communist Party of South Africa the following year. Inspired by Red Army heroism, he fought for the allites in World War II. Between 1946 and 1950, he studied law at the University of South Africa and was politically active. It was during this time he met his lifelong friend, Nelson Mandela. In 1949 Slovo married Ruth First, daughter of Communist Party treasurer Julius First. In the year 1954 Slovo was listed as a communist under the Suppression of Communism Act, and the government banned him from political activity or attending public gatherings in South Africa. Undaunted, he continued to provide legal counsel for black dissidents and in 1955 helped draft the anti-apartheid movement's 'Freedom Charter'. The charter stated that South Africa belonged to all people living in it regardless of race, and that all South Africans should be treated equally before the law and wealth should be distributed equally. While the 'Freedom Charter' was being discussed at the 'Congress of the People' held near Soweto in June 1955, South African police surrounded the building and used the excuse of "Suspected treason" to take the names of all in attendance. The following year, Slovo, Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo and 152 others were arrested for treason under the Suppresion of Communism act. Although Slovo's charges were dropped in 1958, the "Treason Trial" of the others took place until 1961, when the court ruled that the African National Congress did not have a policy of violence. However, a radical faction had split from the group in 1959, dubbing themselves the Pan-Africanist Congress and advocating violence against the apartheid regime. During the 1960's the government issued a program that forced relocation of Africans, coloreds and Asians from areas designated for whites only to homelands and other declared areas. Two decades later, nearly 3.5 million people had been moved. On March 21st 1960, the police opened fire on a peaceful protest against this action in Sharpeville, a black township near Johannesburg. Sixty-nine black Africans were killed and 186 wounded, most shot in the back. The apartheid regime declared a state of emergency, arresting some 18,000 protestors, including ANC and PAC leaders. Slovo was arrested yet again and detained for six months. As international protests mounted and South Africa was expelled from the British Commonwealth, Slovo assisted and became leader of the Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation), the militant branch of the ANC. In 1963, Slovo was out of the country when police raided a compound in Rivonia and found arms and equipment. This led to the arrests of Mandela, Sisulu and others, and eight of them, Mandela and Sisulu included, were sentenced to life imprisonment at Robben Island Prison, a former leper colony off the coase of Cape Town. Slovo went into exile, and for the next 27 years he campaigned, working in bases housed in London, Angola, Zambia, and Mozambique. When the Portuguese colonial government withdrew from Angola in 1975, South Africa invaded with the blessings of both Gerald Ford and Henry Kissinger, fearing that the new Angolan government might allow ANC military bases to develop. The South Africans came close to the Angolan capital, but 10,000 to 12,000 troops sent from Cuba stopped them dead in their tracks. Slovo's wife was killed in 1982 when a parcel bomb exploded in her office. Many believe this bomb was sent by the apartheid regime. Two years later, he was elected secretary of the South African Communist Party, though still in exile. As chaos in South Africa grew, with UN embargoes and overseas companies leaving the country, occuring, the government declared a state of emergency for the first time since the Sharpeville massacre. In 1990, South African moderate President F.W. de Clark, replacing the hardliner P.W. Botha, declares that Mandela will be released, and he also abolishes the ban on the ANC, PAC, SACP, and other previously illegal organizations. Following Mandela's release on Feburary 11th, Slovo returned to the country. Slovo was elected SACP chairperson in 1991 despite ill health. Under Mandela's new government that came about in 1994, Slovo was elected minister of housing, but died in Johannesburg after a long battle with bone marrow cancer. His grave in Hero's Acre is marked by a large slab of stone, with an unmarked upright headstone bearing a hammer and sickle.