Stephen Lee (South African activist)

Stephen Bernard Lee (born c. 1951) is a South African former political prisoner best known for his 1979 escape from Pretoria Local Prison (part of the Pretoria Central Prison complex) with friend and fellow activist Tim Jenkin and a third inmate, Alex Moumbaris. Lee was born in South Africa. After developing an interest in Marxism and involving himself in left-leaning student politics at the University of Cape Town and subsequently switching courses from business science to sociology in 1971, he met Jenkin in a sociology class. They soon became friends and both of them sought out the literature banned by the apartheid government, devouring, photocopying it and swapping it with other students. They both found their sociology course disappointing, as the material reinforced the status quo of the apartheid system. As they started realising the full extent of the unfair system of apartheid, they were fired with a desire to work towards change. Coming to the conclusion they could not effect any real change within the constitutional framework, which banned all effective and truly democratic opposition, they decided the ideals of the African National Congress (ANC) were worth fighting for. The only way they could work for this banned organisation was to move to the UK and make contact with the organisation there, so both set off in February 1974 by ship via Barcelona, spending a few weeks in the Netherlands en route. Upon arrival in London in April 1974, they applied to join the ANC. While the ANC were checking their credentials, Lee went and worked as a carpenter in the Netherlands and taught English in Spain. At the end of 1974, the ANC informed him they had been approved and, after receiving some months of training with them, could return to South Africa to do something for the movement. During this time Lee worked as a bus conductor and joined the Transport and General Workers' Union (TGWU). After their return to Cape Town in July 1975, Lee and Jenkin bought a typewriter, duplicator and stationery to print and post pamphlets and leased first a garage and then a tiny apartment.