Dimpho Hani

Limpho Hani (; born 31 January 1948) is a Mosotho–South African activist who is the widow of anti-apartheid activist Chris Hani. After her husband was assassinated in 1993, she had her own brief political career in the post-apartheid government, representing the African National Congress (ANC) in the National Assembly from May 1994 to August 1999. She also served on the ANC's National Executive Committee during that period. She has since remained in the public eye, partly because of the national symbolic importance of her husband's murder and partly because of her own activism in seeking to oppose parole for the killers.

Early life She was born Limpho Sekamane on 31 January 1948 and is from Sea Point in Maseru, the capital of Lesotho.

Life with Chris Hani: 1973–1993 She married Chris Hani in 1974 at a magistrate's court in Lusaka, Zambia; they had a celebratory wedding lunch at Wimpy. After her wedding, Hani spent time studying overseas in Yugoslavia, but upon her return to Southern Africa in late 1975, Nomakhwezi died aged 23 in 2001.

Hani's husband was a senior leader in Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC), and the South African Communist Party (SACP); the organisations were at that time operating in exile in Southern Africa – primarily out of Lusaka – because they were banned by the apartheid government in South Africa. Hani herself worked for the Lesotho Tourism Board, but she also became increasingly involved in MK operations; after the 1976 Soweto Uprising swelled the ANC's numbers, she was personally involved in smuggling new MK recruits across the South African border and through Swaziland. She returned to Maseru in 1984 and took up employment with the local office of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency and then, from 1985, at the Swedish Embassy in Maseru.

Political career: 1994–1999 In South Africa's first post-apartheid elections in April 1994, Hani was elected to represent the ANC as a Member of the National Assembly, the lower house of the new South African Parliament. She was re-elected in the next general election in June 1999, but she resigned from her seat on 17 August 1999; her seat was filled by Kay Moonsamy. At the same time, she served on the National Executive Committee of the ANC: she was first elected onto the body at the ANC's 49th National Conference in Bloemfontein in December 1994 and she was re-elected in December 1997, but she resigned during her second term "due to other commitments".

TRC and widowhood In the immediate and long-term aftermath of her husband's murder, Hani did not abide sentiments of forgiveness towards the killers, leading Sisonke Msimang to describe "her public refusal to forgive" as "almost heretical" given the conciliatory nation-building narrative exemplified by Nelson Mandela, South Africa's first post-apartheid president.

When a court approved medical parole for Derby-Lewis in 2014, Hani expressed outrage, saying that it was "a very sad day in South Africa". The case was ultimately arbitrated by the Constitutional Court, which ruled in November 2022 that the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services had been irrational in denying parole to Waluś, who had been eligible for release for more than 15 years. In a widely publicised outburst, Hani stormed out of the court after the verdict and told reporters that the judgement was "diabolical" and that the court and Chief Justice Raymond Zondo had "failed this country completely". She said, "This country is finished. In this country, a foreign white [Polish Waluś] can come into South Africa and kill my husband". She also expressed sympathy with the views of Minister Lindiwe Sisulu, who had recently received public attention for attacks on the judiciary and who Hani said was "the only one in this country who saw through these guys". A subsequent application by Hani and the SACP for rescission of the court's order was unanimously dismissed.