Mbongeni Ngema accorded a Special Provincial Funeral Category 2

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President Cyril Ramaphosa has accorded acclaimed playwright and musician Mbongeni Ngema a special provincial funeral, which is to be held in KwaZulu-Natal on Friday.

Premier Nomusa Dube-Ncube says it is a category 2 funeral, which will include police ceremonial honours.

The venue of the funeral service is yet to be announced.

Ngema died last week in a car crash in the Eastern Cape at the age of 68.

The Ngema family has announced that a memorial service will be held on Wednesday at the Durban Playhouse.

Mbongeni Ngema | Government officials pay respects to late playwright’s family:

Tributes

Ngema has been applauded and acknowledged for the role he played in developing the music industry and promoting unity through the arts.

Leading figures in the entertainment industry say Ngema was largely a self-taught artist, having dropped out of school at the age of 12.

Edmund Mhlongo, founder of Ekhaya Multi-Arts Centre, says Ngema had a unique combination of talents.

“He was a unique director who could sing, dance, and write and who could choreograph. Ngema did not go to school to be educated as a theatre director and writer. He learnt a lot of things through hard work and through reading and he became the master of one of the greatest world theatre directors Jerzy Grotowski.”

Ngema worked with well-known theatre luminary, Gibson Kente, as a singer and trainee actor.

In 1981, Ngema created Woza Albert to highlight the apartheid brutality against black people.

Acclaimed producer Anant Singh who adapted Sarafina! the play for the silver screen says Ngema combined music and theatre into a unique form of storytelling.

“Ngema was very special and creative and hugely talented and I think he was one of the creative people in our country during the period of the 80s where he did shows like Asinamali and Woza Albert. I think when he began as a musician, he could be embraced into the stage and how to put these forms together of music storytelling. And then the theatrical performance was really groundbreaking at the time. His inspiration was people like Gibson Kente, but really he took it to a new level.”

Ngema’s works include Sarafina, Asinamali and songs such as Stimela Sase Zola: