MOKOENA, ALICE MARGARET, née MALUKA
(1927– 2015)
Alice Mokoena, known affectionately as Mama Alice, was born on November 4, 1927, on a small farm called Klipfontein in Pretoria, South Africa, one of the eight children of Letta and Johannes Maluka. She died in Soweto on April l, 2015, from cancer. Those who loved her joyful ululations and received her comforting hugs will never forget her.
Raised in a family of strong Anglican faith, Alice and her siblings worked alongside their parents on the farm owned by a German immigrant, Walley Teighman. At the age of 12, she started school, which was three miles from the farm. She completed one year of secondary school then completed a three-year course in domestic science at the Klinerton Training Institute. At that point she was called back to the farm for a year in accordance with the contract her parents had signed.
While at Klinerton, Alice met Wilson Mokoena, whom she married in 1952. He paid a considerable dowry (lobola) for her of 23 cows. Living under apartheid in very trying circumstances, Alice went to work for a doctor as her housekeeper. She gave birth to five children: three girls, Dorothy and Sophia (who both died in infancy) and Matshidiso (Tsidi), and two boys, Thabo and Tefo. After she divorced Wilson in 1962, Alice supported her children by working as a machinist in a clothing factory for very little pay (36 rands a week). In 1970 in Soweto, she joined Mothers' Union, a women's guild whose prayers sustained her and found her work as caregiver to an elderly couple, whose house she eventually inherited.
Alice and her children, like so many South Africans, were inevitably drawn into the fight against apartheid. Her son Thabo, an ANC supporter, was imprisoned and tortured after the Soweto riots. After his release, Alice moved with him to Lesotho, where she took care of the orphaned children of her brother-in-law and his wife. Alice volunteered at the school where she enrolled the children. Cindy Lofstrom, a teacher from New Brunswick, was working at the school, befriended the family, and eventually arranged for Alice and the youngest child, Likomo, to come to Canada. At age 62, Alice settled in Fredericton and two years later brought over her grandson Khothatso.
Honoured as a life member of the Multicultural Association of Fredericton, where she helped to settle many newcomers, Mama Alice was an indefatigable volunteer, generous with her time and energy. She volunteered with many non-profit organizations and was a member of countless groups in the community, including the Mother's Union of St. Anne's Anglican Church, where she sang in the choir; the Wisemenettes, the New Brunswick African Association, and the African Student Union. She served on the board of directors and tenants of St. Anne's Lodge, where she lived. Alice earned her GED and at 79 graduated from St. Thomas University with her BA, with a double major in human rights and anthropology, the eldest member of the class of 2007 and an extraordinary inspiration.
In her later years, she left her beloved Fredericton to live with her grandson Khothatso and his young family in Dartmouth NS, and at the very end she returned home to South Africa. Just over a year before she died, she said she was honoured to have seen Nelson Mandela lying in state and grateful to reflect on the monumental changes that had transpired in her lifetime.
Mama Alice was predeceased by her two infant daughters, her son Thabo, and her former husband Wilson, six of her siblings, and one grandson Eugene.
She is survived by two sisters, Mabel and Mosading; her daughter Tsidi and son Tefo; her grandchildren, including Khothatso, and several great-grandchildren.
For those who wish to make a donation in memory of Mama Alice, an account has been set up in the name of Tsidi Mokoena, ABSA (African Bank of South Africa) Bara Mall.
For those wishing to write, Tsidi's address is 5363 Zone 5, Pimville, Soweto, South Africa.