This is an archive of the Treatment Action Campaign's public documents from December 1998 until October 2008. I created this website because the TAC's website appears unmaintained and people were concerned that it
was becoming increasingly hard to find important documents.

The menu items have been slightly edited and a new stylesheet applied to the site. But none of the documents have been edited, not even for minor errors. The text appears on this site as obtained from the Internet Archive.

The period covered by the archive encompassed the campaign for HIV medicines, the civil disobedience campaigns, the Competition Commission complaints, the 2008 xenophobic violence and the PMTCT, Khayelitsha health workers and Matthias Rath court cases.

 
Newsletter
 

13 March 2004

Dullah Omar, South African Minister of Transport and Anti-Apartheid Lawyer, Dies of Hodgkins Disease


The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) expresses its condolences to Farida Omar and the family of Dullah Omar. Minister Omar died early Saturday morning of Hodgkins Disease, a form of cancer that affects lymphatic tissue.

Minister Omar was a human rights lawyer who took on the Apartheid regime. He dedicated most of his adult life to fighting for the rights of people oppressed by the National Party government, especially the poor. He frequently did not charge for his services and made enormous personal and financial sacrifices for his clients. After the fall of Apartheid, he became Minster of Justice, then Minister of Transport. But he and Farida continued to live in the same modest house in Rylands, Cape Town.

Minister Omar was a mentor to TAC chairperson, Zackie Achmat when Achmat was a young political activist. He had a substantial influence on Achmat's undertanding of the law and its usefulness for redressing injustice.

Our thoughts are with Minister Omar's family during this difficult time.

[ENDS]