Dumisani
Kumalo, longtime Project Director of the American Committee on Africa and The Africa Fund, is now South Africa's Ambassador to the
United Nations. Kumalo played a key role
in the campaigns to isolate apartheid South Africa. He coordinated ACOA's
work with states and municipal officials to adopt divestment and selective
purchasing policies. He traveled extensively across the U.S. and coordinated
three conferences on Public Investment and South Africa. This work resulted in 26 states, 24counties
and over 90 cities taking economic action against apartheid. For many of these years I served as his
principle assistant. Clyde Haberman wrote a column on Kumalo in the New York Times on June 8, 1999.
For current
information on Kumalo visit the Permanent Mission of South
Africa to the UN web site. A report Our Man at the UN in February 3, 2003 issue
of the Sunday
Times (Johannesburg) outlines the
important role he is playing in the UN on Iraq.
Below is the
press statement on his appointment by The Africa Fund.
Richard
Knight, Updated February 3, 2003; originally posted April 2001
The Africa Fund
April 1, 1999
Ambassador Dumisani Kumalo appointed Permanent Representative to the South African Mission to the United Nations.
The Africa Fund is delighted to announce the appointment of its longtime Projects Director, Dumisani S. Kumalo, as South Africa's Ambassador to the United Nations. For many years Kumalo worked tirelessly to educate the American people about the injustices of apartheid and helped mobilize effective public support for the struggle for freedom.
The following statement was issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs of South Africa.
MEDIA STATEMENT ON THE APPOINTMENT OF SOUTH AFRICA'S PERMANENT REPRESENTATIVE TO THE UNITED NATIONS IN NEW YORK
Foreign Minister Alfred Nzo is pleased to announce the appointment of Ambassador Dumisani Shadrack Kumalo as the Permanent Representative to the South African Mission at the United Nations in New York, with effect from 5 April 1999.
Mr. Kumalo (52), has been the Director of the United States Desk since joining the Department of Foreign Affairs in 1997.
Before joining the Department of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Kumalo lived for more than 20 years in political exile in the United States of America where he studied journalism at Indiana University and he also worked on two U.S. newspapers. Before leaving South Africa, he worked as a political reporter for the Golden City Post, the World Newspapers, DRUM, and the Johannesburg Sunday Times.
While in New York, he was attached to the African National Congress Mission to the United Nations where he was responsible for supporting the work of the Special Committee Against Apartheid. Mr. Kumalo also served as Projects Director of the Africa Fund, an American non-governmental organization, which coordinated the divestment movement, which led to more than 30 states, 400 universities and scores of cities divesting their pension funds from U.S. banks and companies which were doing business with the apartheid regime.
Mr. Kumalo is divorced and lives with his grown son who works as an investment banker in South Africa.
Issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs
Pretoria
30 March 1999
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