Samuel Makama Martin Masabalala
South African trade unionist and political organiser, in Uniondale, Cape Colony. He helped form one of South Africa’s first trade unions for black and mixed-race workers. His arrest in 1920 to prevent him from calling for a strike for higher wages led to the Masabalala Massacre, when a crowd demanding his release from a jail where he was kept without charge led to 24 people killed by police. An early member of the liberation party the African National Congress, he was noted for his ability to captivate listeners, speaking fluently in Xhosa, Sotho, Afrikaans and English.