FAMILY – Achmat’s children
“My Dad used his talents every day, to become an instrument of peace and an instrument of hope. He was a remarkable human being who saw in others what they did not see in themselves. He always believed that everyone had the potential inside of themselves to do better, to aim higher. He was one of the kindest and gentlest people that I knew.”
Justine Dangor, Achmat’s daughter, at the NMF’s memorial for Achmat, 2020
“My father was the best man I have ever known. He was so intelligent and so kind and so forgiving … He was special … Something special about him was that he was quiet, yet his presence was so loud.”
Zachary Dangor, Achmat’s son, at the NMF’s memorial for Achmat, 2020
Celebrating Achmat’s birthday at Tortellini D’Oro in Oaklands, Johannesburg where the family went most years to celebrate Achmat’s birthday, 2018, Private Collection Audrey Elster
Achmat’s children
In 1973 Achmat and Beverley Camhee married and initially lived in Newclare where their first child Justine was born a year later. Their second child, a daughter Clea, passed away when she was about a year old. After the family moved to Riverlea around 1979/1980 the couple’s third child Zain was born in 1980. Achmat and Beverley parted later in the decade. Achmat met Audrey Elster in Glasgow in 1990 and Audrey immigrated to South Africa a year later. Before moving to Parkview in 1993, the couple lived in Bertrams and Malvern in Johannesburg. In 2005, their son Zachary was born in Geneva.
Achmat shared his love of reading and writing with his children. Justine remembered “We spent a lot of time going to bookshops and a lot of time sitting and reading together.” Audrey recalled that “Achmat just loved to read to Zach and got quite into children’s stories. He loved making up stories they were just incredible, far-fetched stories about children and animals”. Achmat, in an article published in the Sunday Times around 2012 wrote “I read to our son every night, a ritual he loves as much as I do. And it isn’t just the usual fairytale fare he likes but adventure books about characters who are obsessively cheerful, incorrigibly loud, abnormally nimble or incurably nosey. There also books translated from Zulu, such as Mafutha the Elephant [by Alan Glass and Ed Jordan].” When Zachary was seven he and his dad wrote a short story “We are going to teach the hadadas to sing” which was published in the Sunday Times.
“Achmat cared, he really cared about people and when Achmat got married, I lived with him and Beverley for a short while. Justine was a toddler and Clea was just born. [We lived] in the family home where we grew up in Newclare. My elder brother Mohammed was living on the one side and Achmat and Beverley shared the other side. Clea passed away. She was about a year old. She was a baby … That was a sad period in Achmat’s life and a very trying time for Achmat, because at the time he was banned, he couldn’t move around freely, I think he was still working for Revlon, but he was also involved in many, many, other organisations.”
Moosa Dangor, Achmat’s younger brother
“He was never a nine-to-five father. There was never a time for him to be strict and I think he valued the time that he got with me more than anything else … My dad loved the coast, so we’d gone to the Wild Coast a few times, but you need to remember that there was never any money to do that, so …holidays were very few and far between … Birthdays were always a big deal and as I got older, especially in the last, I would say ten years with my daughters, birthdays and also end-of-year suppers and lunches became very important.”
Justine Dangor, Achmat’s daughter
“I remember travelling a lot with my dad around South Africa, to St. Francis Bay and Plet, but also around the world… we went to watch Manchester United and it was quite a rough experience … I was always very grateful for that, because he always did a lot of things that were not his favourite thing, but it was because I enjoyed them so much…My mom and dad were very involved in my birthdays and my dad would celebrate Christmas with us every year…My Dad used to teach me how to play poker … and we would play monopoly together those family games and he would turn into a different man. It was scary. He would become a real business man and he was ruthless.”
Zachary Dangor, Achmat’s son
“Achmat, as a father, I think, felt bad throughout his life that he was not present enough for his first two children’s upbringing because there is a limit to what one person can do and as an activist and working full-time and writing, he wasn’t around enough physically and I think he felt really bad about that …”
Audrey Elster, Achmat’s wife and partner of thirty years
