4 June 2015
The South African Communist Party (SACP) is deeply shocked and saddened about the sudden death of our Central Committee member, eThekwini councillor and long-time activist, Comrade Judy Mulqueeny who succumbed to death on Wednesday, June 3, 2015.
Comrade Mulqueeny played various roles in the struggle, and joined the SACP in the 1980s while in Lesotho. She also worked underground in SACP structures in the eThekwini area, and was consistently elected to the KZN Provincial Executive Committee of the SACP since from 1991.
She served on the SACP Central Committee from 2002 to 2007 and again since 2013. Judy returned to the Central Committee at the 13th Congress in 2013, having had a 5 year break from national leadership, spending that time in indulging in her passion of training. She would not let slip any opportunity for running political education classes.
Trained as a teacher, she extended her activities in a variety of civil society organisations and worked for several NGOs. She had a huge passion for cooperatives, which she saw as crucial to deepening the transformation of our society.
Judy’s lifeblood was the emancipation and empowerment of women. She was the most prolific contributor in discussions, writing and presentations on women and gender, not only in the conventional areas such as HIV and AIDS and social development, but also in the economic and political sphere. Her writing on gender equality must not be allowed to be lost.
She was known to be a very humble, unassuming comrade, with a strong commitment to the grassroots work. Judy served as a proportional councillor on the Ethekwini Metro Council. This allowed her to fulfil her passion to improving the lives of the people who bore the brunt of poverty and unemployment.
She refused to buy a car and preferred to use public transport because “that’s how most people travel and “I like to be with them”, she once told a friend.
Judy was passionate about the arts and culture. She would always be seen at poetry readings, musical events. She spent many months during a period of unemployment learning creative writing to create a balance with her passion for writing about ideological issues.
SACP General Secretary, Blade Nzimande said: “We have a lost a very consistent, hard-working, unique, comrade and we deeply regret her passing away. Her loss will be felt not just by the SACP but many other community structures in which she put so much effort. We convey our deepest condolences to her family.”
We will be consulting with the structures in the Province; Municipality as well as the family to determine the process towards the burial, and once they are finalized we will communicate them to all structures and the public.
We deep our revolutionary banners in respect to the great gender activist; humbly servant of the working class and poor and communist to the end. Let her fighting spirit leaves on as we pick up the spear, to continue with the struggle for the defence; consolidation; advancement of the NDR and for a socialist SA and the World.
Issued by the SACP Head Offices
Contact: Mhlekwa Nxumalo: Acting Spokesperson
Office: 011 339 3621/2
Mobile: 072 51 777 61 or 082 837 0530
Twitter: @SACP1921