in her 1996 testimony to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Her other community activism included serving as the president of the Black Consumer Union of South Africa and the Maggie Magaba Trust. On the 1985 publication of her autobiography, Call Me Woman, in which she described being beaten by her husband, Kuzwayo became the first black writer to win South Africa's leading literary prize, the CNA Award. After Nelson Mandela was inaugurated as South African president in 1994, Kuzwayo became a member of the country's first multiracial Parliament, aged 79, and served for five years until June 1999, when she was South Africa's longest-serving parliamentarian. With director Betty Wolpert, Kuzwayo was involved in making the documentary films Awake from Mourning (1982) and Tsiamelo –– A Place of Goodness (1983), which drew on the story of the dispossession of her family's farmland. Kuzwayo died in Johannesburg, aged 91, of complications from diabetes, survived by her sons, Bobo and Justice Moloto, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Awards and recognition In 1979 Ellen Kuzwayo was named Woman of the Year by the Johannesburg newspaper The Star, and was nominated again in 1984. In 1987 she was awarded an honorary doctorate of Laws from the University of the Witwatersrand, the first black woman to receive an honorary degree from the university. She also awarded honorary doctorates by the University of Natal and the University of Port Elizabeth. She was awarded the Order of Meritorious Service by Nelson Mandela in 1999. A South African marine research ship was named after her, the Ellen Khuzwayo, was launched in 2007. Works Call Me Woman. London: The Women's Press (1985). , reprinted Aunt Lute Books, 1992 Sit Down and Listen: Stories from South Africa, London: The Women's Press, 1990. References External links "Another Milestone for Ellen Kuzwayo", City of Johannesburg website, 7 December 2004. 1914 births 2006 deaths 20th-century South African women politicians 20th-century South African politicians 20th-century South African women writers 20th-century South African writers African National Congress politicians Deaths from diabetes Members of the National Assembly of South Africa South African activists South African autobiographers South African women activists South African writers Women autobiographers Women members of the National Assembly of South Africa