Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi

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Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi
MPL
Member of the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature
Assumed office
18 June 1999
Personal details
Born
Shameen Thakur

(1964-11-17) 17 November 1964 (age 59)
Natal
South Africa
Political partyMinority Front
Spouse
​
​
(m. 2001; died 2011)​
Alma materUniversity of Durban-Westville
University of KwaZulu-Natal

Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi (née Thakur; born 17 November 1964) is a South African politician who has been the leader of the Minority Front since 2012. She has represented the party in the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature since 1999.

After two decades of practice as a pharmacist in

Roy Bhoola
; those disputes were largely settled in December 2013, when all parties affirmed Thakur-Rajbansi's leadership.

Early life and career

Thakur-Rajbansi was born on 17 November 1964 in

mineworker of Indian origin.[1] She was raised and educated in Newcastle in northwest Natal; an avid competitive debater, she was also head girl at St Oswald's High School in 1982, the year she matriculated.[1][2]

Thakur-Rajbansi's father referred to his six daughters as his "sons" and encouraged them to pursue further education. Although Thakur-Rajbansi, the eldest daughter, wanted to become a lawyer, he encouraged her to pursue medicine.[2] After he died in a shooting during her matric year,[2] she enrolled at the University of Durban-Westville to study science.[1] She graduated in 1987 with a Bachelor of Pharmacy and moved to Ladysmith to complete her pharmaceutical traineeship at Ladysmith Provincial Hospital.[1]

In 1990, Thakur-Rajbansi opened a retail pharmacy, Eastbury Pharmacy, in Easterly in Phoenix, a majority-Indian settlement outside Durban.[1] She practiced as a pharmacist for two decades, including during her early political career, until she sold the pharmacy in 2010 to pursue politics full-time.[1] Also in 2010, she completed a Master of Business Administration at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.[1][2]

Political career

Ordinary Member of the Legislature: 1999–2012

Thakur-Rajbansi joined the Minority Front (MF) in 1998 after expressing an interest in politics to Amichand Rajbansi, the party's founder, who later became her husband.[2] She was elected as chairperson of the MF Women's League.[1] The following year, in the 1999 general election, she was elected to represent the MF in the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature; she and Rajbansi held the party's two seats in the legislature.[1] After 1999, she secured re-election in four consecutive elections, most recently as the sole MF representative elected in the 2019 general election.[3]

Leader of the Minority Front: 2012–present

Leadership dispute: 2012–2013

Thakur-Rajbansi was appointed as interim leader of the MF in 2011 when Rajbansi fell ill.[4] Shortly after his death, on 19 January 2012, the MF announced that its leadership had appointed Thakur-Rajbansi to succeed her husband as party president.[5] She said that she would seek to continue Rajbansi's legacy, particularly by maintaining the party's staunch support for the protection of minority rights.[6] Her stepson, Vimal Rajbansi, welcomed her appointment and said that the rest of Rajbansi's family would not be directly involved in the governance of the party.[6] However, later in 2012, he launched a campaign to oust Thakur-Rajbansi from the party presidency, telling the press that she had "become an autocrat and a law onto herself".[7] He said that he and his mother, Amichand Rajbansi's first wife Asha Devi, would avail themselves "to step in and save the party".[8]

Thakur-Rajbansi with MF supporters at the party's 2019 election manifesto launch in Chatsworth

Among the matters of contention was an attempt by Thakur-Rajbansi to remove

Durban High Court. The dispute was not settled until December 2013, when the disputants announced that they had reached an out-of-court settlement, in terms of which all parties agreed to affirm Thakur-Rajbansi's presidency.[4]

Electoral decline: 2014–present

By the time of the 2016 local elections, the Business Day observed that the MF had "disintegrated under the leadership" of Thakur-Rajbansi, particularly due to fragmentation caused by internal disputes.[10] The party lost its parliamentary representation in the 2014 general election, retaining only Thakur-Rajbansi's seat in the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature.[11]

Personal life

Thakur-Rajbansi was formerly married to a school teacher,[1] who died in 1993.[12] Their first child died as an infant. Their second, a son born in 1991 and named Pradhil, had Addison's disease.[1] Pradhil, a MF politician and researcher, died in a road accident with his fiancée in KwaZulu-Natal in November 2022.[13]

Thakur-Rajbansi remarried to Amichand Rajbansi on 30 March 2001 in Durban at a traditional Hindu ceremony that included speeches by politicians Faith Gasa and Margaret Rajbally.[12] She thus became stepmother to Rajbansi's four children from his first marriage.[12] Rajbansi died on 29 December 2011 after a stay in hospital for bronchitis.[14] In addition to the family dispute over control of the MF (see above), his death precipitated conflict over the execution his will. Although Thakur-Rajbansi was appointed as executor, her appointment was challenged in court by two of her stepdaughters; Rajbansi had written four wills between 2000 and 2010, and the most recent two versions excluded Thakur-Rajbansi from the executor position and from her trusteeship at the Amichand Rajbansi Family Trust.[15]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l "Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi". Minority Front. 26 April 2001. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  2. ^ a b c d e f "Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi: Driven by a hunger for knowledge". The Post. 17 June 2015. Retrieved 24 June 2023 – via PressReader.
  3. ^ "Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi". People's Assembly. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  4. ^ a b "Thakur Rajbansi declared MF leader". IOL. 11 December 2013. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  5. ^ "Shameen Thakur-Rajbansi appointed new MF leader". SABC News. 19 January 2012. Archived from the original on 2 December 2013. Retrieved 25 November 2013.
  6. ^ a b "'He was my leader, mentor and friend'". Sunday Times. 22 January 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  7. ^ a b "'Step down, Shameen'". News24. 1 September 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  8. ^ Soobramoney, Viasen (29 August 2012). "Minority Front factions causes friction". IOL.
  9. ^ Naidoo, Mervyn (18 November 2012). "Rajbansi is ousted as head of Minority Front". IOL.
  10. ^ "The Indian vote is the prize political parties are chasing in KwaZulu-Natal". Business Day. 3 July 2016. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  11. ^ "Minority Front confident it will reclaim lost support". SABC News. 1 October 2021. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  12. ^ a b c "Rajbansi to wed pharmacist". News24. 29 March 2001. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  13. ^ Bennie, Shorné (3 November 2022). "Condolences pour in for family of Minority Front leader, whose son and his fiancé died in N3 crash". Witness. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  14. ^ "Minority Front's 'Bengal Tiger' Rajbansi dies". The Mail & Guardian. 29 December 2011. Retrieved 24 June 2023.
  15. ^ Biyela, Lunga (11 April 2012). "Rajbansi's second wife stays executrix of his sizeable estate". Witness. Retrieved 24 June 2023.

External links

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