[DEBATE] : (Fwd) Hugh Lewin on Eve Hall

[Patrick Bond]

Energetic exile
who came home
by Hugh Lewin
for the Mail&Guardian, Johannesburg

Eve Hall, who died aged 70 at her home near Nelspruit on 23 October, was 
one of the first women activists to be imprisoned for defiance of 
apartheid. Through nearly 50 years, Eve's life exemplified what it was 
to be an anti-apartheid activist and to live, as she did with her 
husband Tony and three sons, in energetic exile.

Eve was born in 1937 in France and lived in Paris with her mother during 
the German occupation. They came to South Africa after the war to join 
her father, who was Jewish and whose mother and sister died in 
concentration camps. Eve matriculated at Kingsmead and, after her 
studies at Wits, joined the Congress movement the day after the 
shootings at Sharpeville. She had her own first taste of apartheid's 
nastiness soon afterwards when she was sentenced to six months 
imprisonment for launching a leaflet and poster campaign promoting the 
banned ANC. By 1964 she and Tony were "listed" for being members of a 
banned organisation, which made impossible their continued existence as 
journalists in Johannesburg, so the family left on what became a 26-year 
trek in exile, mainly through Africa and Asia, and in UK, as "gypsy 
journalists and development workers".

During the first 15 years of exile, Eve and the boys followed where 
Tony's jobs took them. But Eve always worked: for instance, as a 
teacher; and as women's editor of The Nation, Kenya's biggest daily, 
which involved a variety of activities, from Agony Aunt to fashion 
editor and even astrologer. Later, as activist in Dar es Salaam, she 
launched the ANC women section's "Voice of Women" – and shared reporting 
on India with Tony as Oxfam information officer in Delhi.

The family moved to the UK in 1976, driving overland from India, and Eve 
took an MA in rural sociology at Reading, which launched her on her UN 
development career. Now Tony became the "trailing spouse" as Eve blazed 
her trail, particularly in East and Southern Africa, working for the ILO 
and launching a number of women's community development projects.

What she described as her happiest project came in 1991 when Eve and 
Tony could return to South Africa after 26 years of exile, living 
firstly in Yeoville, then in their Matumi bush retreat. There Eve 
maintained some of her international projects and turned to more local 
concerns, such as helping set up a co-op for laid-off workers in a rural 
leather factory and joining HEAL, a valley conservancy and community 
promotion group…until her fiercest challenge, which Eve fought with huge 
courage and candour: a six-and-a-half-year battle with stage-four breast 
cancer, which never stopped her maintaining contact with an array of 
friends and colleagues world-wide, for whom she remained a powerful icon.

Eve Hall, born Paris, 20 March 1937; died at home near Nelspruit, 23 
October 2007