Mduduzi Manana

Mduduzi Comfort Manana (born 12 February 1984) is a South African politician from Mpumalanga.

Manana was born on 12 February 1984 in Ermelo in the former Eastern Transvaal (present-day Mpumalanga).

He is the only child of Sibongile Manana, a single mother and politician of the African National Congress (ANC).

He became involved in politics as a teenager, joining the Congress of South African Students and ANC Youth League in 1998.

In March 2003, he was one of 31 members of the Iraq Action Committee who travelled from South Africa to Baghdad to volunteer as human shields ahead of the American-led invasion of Iraq.

Then aged 19 and the proprietor of an event management company, he told the press that he was "going to protest oppression and injustice – freedom and justice are causes for which I am prepared to die."

He returned home earlier than planned a week later, saying that he was severely traumatised by events in Baghdad.

Manana went on to complete a Bachelor of Arts in political science and sociology at the University of Natal.

At the same time, he remained politically active, rising through the ranks of the ANC Youth League: in 2005, he was elected chairperson of the league's branch in Ermelo, as well as chairperson of the local branch of the South African Communist Party's Young Communist League; and in 2006 he was elected to the league's regional executive committee in the broader Gert Sibande district.

During this period, he was twice convicted of criminal theft, on one occasion for stealing a can of Coca-Cola.

He was elected to the ANC Youth League's National Executive Committee for the first time in 2008.

Manana stood as an ANC candidate in the 2009 general election and won a seat in the National Assembly, the lower house of the South African Parliament.

According to the Mail & Guardian, he was the youngest Member of Parliament at the time.

He served on two portfolio committees – the Portfolio Committee on Public Works and Portfolio Committee on International Relations and Cooperation – and he also represented Parliament on the Magistrate's Commission.

He was re-elected to the ANC Youth League National Executive Committee in June 2011, and he was also considered, by opponents of incumbent league president Julius Malema, as a possible contender to run for higher office in the league.

He was the Deputy Minister of Higher Education and Training from 2012 to 2017 and represented the African National Congress (ANC) in the National Assembly from 2009 to 2018.

Manana rose to political prominence through the ANC Youth League and was aged 28 when President Jacob Zuma appointed him as a deputy minister in June 2012.

In April 2012, Manana caused a minor stir by contradicting Malema's supporters in an interview with the New Age: Manana said that it was a "misrepresentation of the facts" to claim, as some had, that the league's leadership had resolved to support Malema even if he was convicted on disciplinary charges by the mainstream ANC.

Manana's statement put him in alignment with President Jacob Zuma, who was pursuing Malema's removal, and his comments led league deputy president Ronald Lamola to condemn his "ill-discipline".

On 12 June 2012, President Zuma announced a cabinet reshuffle in which Manana was appointed as Deputy Minister of Higher Education and Training.

He deputised Blade Nzimande and, aged 28, became the youngest deputy minister in the post-apartheid period.

The promotion was rumoured to be a reward for defending Zuma's moves against Malema.

The South African Students Congress professed itself "utterly dismayed, taken aback, angry, flabbergasted, disappointed and annoyed" by Manana's appointment, saying in a statement, "We do not have any reason to believe that Mr. Manana is up to the task of being a deputy minister of such a complex and strategic department."

Manana defended himself, pointing to his "energy" and personal experience in institutions of higher education, and argued that students ought not to "undermine the president and question his capacity to appoint members of the executive".

He resigned from that office in August 2017 after he was charged with assaulting three women outside a Johannesburg nightclub; he pled guilty to the charges the following month.

Manana has been a member of the ANC National Executive Committee since December 2017.

Since early 2023, he has worked full-time for the party as head of organising at Luthuli House.

In the early hours of Sunday morning on 6 August 2017, Manana was involved in the assault of three women at a nightclub, Cubana, in Fourways in northern Johannesburg.

The story broke in the media later on Sunday.

One of the women, Mandisa Duma, told City Press that the altercation had begun inside the club with a heated political debate about whether Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma or Cyril Ramaphosa should be chosen to succeed Zuma as ANC president.

When the argument became hostile, Duma and her friends had left the club, one of them making a comment about Manana being gay, which apparently triggered the assault.

In Duma's account, Manana had slapped one of the women and pulled her hair and then had slapped another outside the club, as Manana's friends attacked the others.

In addition to video footage of part of the assault, which went viral on social media, press released an audio recording in which Manana appeared to confess to the assault.

In the clip, Manana says in Zulu, "My brother, when she swore at me and called me gay, I slapped her".

On 7 August, Manana posted an apology to Twitter, writing, "Regardless of the extreme provocation, I should have exercised restraint. That shameful incident should not have happened."

The opposition Economic Freedom Fighters called on Manana to resign and hand himself over to the police, and the police said that an arrest was imminent.

He made his first court appearance in the Randburg Magistrate's Court on 10 August and was released on R5,000 bail.

Journalists were not allowed inside the courtroom, leading to allegations that Manana was receiving preferential treatment, but Police Minister Fikile Mbalula said that he "will not be treated with special kid gloves but will face the full wrath of the law".

On 13 September 2017, Manana was convicted on three counts of assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm, having pled guilty to assaulting the women.

He remained an ordinary member of the National Assembly until July 2018, when he submitted to ongoing pressure to resign.