Lieutenant General Andrew Masondo, born Andrew Mandla Lekoto Masondo (27 October 1936 – 20 April 2008) was a South African mathematician, political prisoner, a former general in the South African National Defence Force (SANDF), and a national commissar of the African National Congress's military wing, Umkhonto weSizwe, Early life and education Andrew Masondo was born on 27 October 1936 in Sophiatown, Johannesburg, to Alois Emmanuel Mathanjane Masondo, and Elsie Seraka Masondo. He was raised in a working class African family who believed in the value of education. After completing Grade 12 in 1954, Masondo went to Fort Hare University and majored in physics and mathematics. He completed his BSc in 1957 and, in the following year, became one of the first two black students to complete the BSc (Honours) degree in applied mathematics at the University of the Witwatersrand. In 1959, these two students completed the one-year University Education Diploma at Fort Hare, again the first black students to do so. By 1960, Masondo was lecturing pure and applied mathematics at the University of Fort Hare. His wide reading and cultural interaction with other scholars as well as the township community helped to develop an individual in touch with diverse groups of people. Military career and activism In 1953, Andrew Masondo joined the African National Congress (ANC). In 1962/3, he held several posts within the structure of the ANC in the Eastern Cape, mainly as a rural area organiser but also in the higher command structure. In 1963, as the command director of the underground Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) movement, the military wing of the ANC, he began to take part in sabotage activities in South Africa, cutting electricity pylons in the vicinity of Alice, armed with a number of devices, including a saw and an old rifle he had found buried in a garden. Imprisonment Masondo was arrested in 1963 and sentenced to twelve years' imprisonment on Robben Island, where he was later joined by top Rivonia trialists such as Govan Mbeki, Walter Sisulu, and Nelson Mandela. In 1964, he was sentenced to an additional three years, two of which would be served concurrently with his original sentence, bringing the total to thirteen years. In prison, Masondo again turned to education. Through UNISA, he completed second-year mathematical statistics and third-year mathematics for the second time and obtained his BSc (Honours) in Mathematical Statistics. In 1975, he registered for a