Essop Pahad

Essop Pahad
Essop Pahad (1985)
Minister in the Presidency
In office 14 June 1999 – 24 September 2008
Member of Parliament
Incumbent
Assumed office 10 May 1994
Parliamentary Counsellor
In office 10 May 1994 – 14 June 1999
Personal details
Born	(1939-06-21) June 21, 1939 (age 77) Schweizer-Reneke, North West, South Africa
Political party	African National Congress
Children	one son and one daughter
Alma mater	University of the Witwatersrand University of Sussex

Essop Goolam Pahad (born 21 June 1939) is a South African politician. He was Minister in the Presidency from 1999 to September 2008.

Pahad was born in Schweizer-Reneke in the former Transvaal province. He is an alumnus of both the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and the University of Sussex. He started his academic career with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science at Wits. At the University of Sussex, he completed a Master of Arts in African Politics as well as his PhD in History. The title of his thesis was "The Development of Indian Political Movements in South Africa 1924 - 1946." He is the brother of Aziz Pahad.

His political career began in 1958 when he became a member of the Transvaal Indian Youth Congress. In 1962 Pahad was arrested for organising an illegal strike, following the banning of the African National Congress. In December 1964, Pahad was banned for five years and went into exile. While in exile, Pahad became more actively involved with the ANC and the SACP. He represented the SACP on the editorial council for the World Marxist Review.

After the 1994 democratic election, Pahad served as the Parliamentary Counsellor to then-Deputy President Thabo Mbeki. He was appointed as the Minister in the Presidency after the 1999 general election. In 2000 it was reported that at a closed session of the ANC's governance committee Pahad tried to quash an inquiry into corruption in the Arms Deal, an accusation that Pahad denies despite numerous reports to the contrary.