Cissie is a new play written and directed by Nadia Davids, whose parents and grandparents lived in District Six. It is the story of Cissie GOOL, a District Six activist. Nadia first used Cissie as the subject of her high school oral history project, for which she interviewed people who had known Cissie. When Nadia was doing her PhD in theatre, she wrote about Cissie in her thesis.
Zainunnissa "Cissie" ABDURAHMAN was born in Cape Town on 06 November 1897 to Dr. Abdullah ABDURAHMAN (or ABDURAGHMAN), and his wife Helen (Nellie) Potter ABDURAHMAN (maiden name JAMES). Her father (1872-1940) was born in Wellington, Cape, and was of Indian ancestry. Her mother (1870s-1953) was a Scottish suffragette. According to the IGI, Helen Potter JAMES was born on 02 September 1872 to John Cuming JAMES and Harriette STOUT in Greenock, Renfrew, Scotland.
Cissie's father was the eldest son of the nine surviving children of a Cape Malay, Abdul ARRAMAN / RACHMAN and his wife, Kadija Dollie. His grandparents, Abdul and Betsy JEMAALEE bought their freedom from slavery in Cape Town and were friends of Lady Duff GORDON, being mentioned in her Letters from the Cape. Abdullah was the first Cape Malay to attend the South African College. In 1888 he enrolled at the University of Glasgow and in 1893 obtained the M.B.,C.M. degree. After graduating, he did post-graduate work in London. While in London he married Helen, whom he had met when a student in Glasgow. Two daughters were born of this marriage, Cissie and Waradea. In 1895 they returned to Cape Town and he started his own medical practice. The marriage ended in 1923 and in 1925 Abdullah married Margaret May STANSFIELD, who was living in Vancouver in 1965. Margaret May STANSFIELD was born in Somerset West on 31 December 1899. She died in April 1972 in Vancouver, Canada. They had a son and two daughters, including Begum who married Prof. Ralp HENDRICKSE. Cissie's father was the first non-white to serve as a city councillor, from 1905 to 1940, and was also leader of the African People's Organisation which he had helped establish in 1902.
Helen was a member of several Cape Town organizations, including the Cape Town and Wynberg General Board of Aid, the Ratepayer's Association, the Women's Municipal Association, the African People's Organization Women's Guild, Western Province Amateur Musical Society, the Women's Enfranchisement League and the National Liberation League Finance Committee.
The ABDURAHMAN home was in Mount Street in the early 1900s. They also lived at Oak Lodge, 173 Kloof Street. Cissie grew up learning Latin, reciting Tennyson and playing Mozart. She marched with Mahatma Gandhi, met Olive Schreiner at a dinner her parents hosted, and later became the first coloured woman to earn an MA in Psychology. Cissie studied at the University of Cape Town where she obtained the degrees of B.A. (1932), M.A. (1933) and LL.B. (1962).
One of her earliest political actions was to organise a march to Parliament in March 1930 to protest against the Women’s Enfranchisement Bill, which gave the vote to white women only. She joined the Socialist Party. In February 1935, with her husband and Communist Party member Sam KAHN, Cissie established the Anti-Fascist League in Cape Town. A few months later she was the first South African woman to lead a national liberation movement, the National Liberation League, which she founded. In August 1938 Cissie was elected to the Cape Town City Council, the first non-white woman in the country to serve in local government. She served from 1938 to 1951, representing District Six. For several years she was the only woman serving on the city council. In 1949 she was elected chairwoman of the city’s Public Health Committee, a position her father had also held. During the 1940s, she became the president of the Non-European Front. In 1946 Cissie took part in a campaign to start a movement of passive resistance in Natal and together with nine Indians was charged in the Durban magistrate's court. She pleaded guilty and was sentenced to a £3 fine which she refused to pay. She was then sentenced to imprisonment but was released a week later when her son, Shaheen (20), took his own life in Cape Town. In 1962 she received an LLB degree from the University of Cape Town and was admitted as an advocate to the Supreme Court, the first non-white woman.
In 1919 she married Dr. Abdul Hamid GOOL, a medical practitioner and a graduate of Guy's Hospital, London. There were three children from this marriage, including Rustum Yusef (1923-). After 20 years of marriage, they divorced in the 1940s and Cissie moved in with Sam KAHN, a Jewish member of the Communist Party. Cissie died on 04 July 1963 from a stroke. She was known as the "Jewel of District Six" and Cape Town's "Joan of Arc".
Sources:
1) Estate file of Abdullah ABDURAHMAN (MOOC Vol. No. 6/9/6016 ref. 67759)
2) Estate file of Helen Potter ABDURAHMAN (MOOC Vol. No. 6/9/21168 ref. 3349/53)
3) Divorce record of Abdul Hamid GOOL and Zainunnissa ABDURAHMAN (CSC Vol. No. 2/1/1/1428 ref 563)
4) Abdullah ABDURAHMAN Family Papers (Unisa, ref AAS223, 1906-1962; UCT Libraries, ref BC506, 1882-1954; and ref BCZA83/30-34, 1906-1962)
5) Not only the younger daughter of Doctor Abdurahman, PhD dissertation, University of Cape Town, 2002, by Patricia van der Spuy
6) Zainunnissa Cissie Gool 1897-1963: A biography of Cissie Gool in Images and Words, MA thesis, University of Cape Town, 2002, by E. Everett
7) Dictionary of South African Biography
8) International Genealogical Index