Noor ebrahim was the co-founder of District 6 museum.

• The co-founder and education officer of Cape Town’s District Six museum has died. 
• Noor Ebrahim lived in District Six and was forcibly removed in 1966 after it was zoned for white people. 
• He took pictures before he left, and his life’s work was to keep the memory alive of the forced removals, and to celebrate and share knowledge of the rich cultural heritage of the area.

Noor Ebrahim, co-founder and education officer of Cape
Town’s world-famous District Six Museum, has died, his son said on
Saturday. 

Ebrahim was 79. 

A mesmerising raconteur, he was known for his deep cultural
knowledge of District Six, as well as his personal experience and insight into
the inhumane forced removals that broke the vibrant community up for relocation
to the outskirts of the city when the area was zoned for white people in 1966.

Ebrahim’s son, Igsaak, told News24 that his father had been
very passionate about the museum and his work, leading local and international
visitors around and retelling the history of the vibrant suburb and its
descendants. 

“Some people would come for another trip from overseas
and come back to the museum and ask for my father,” he said. 

The museum’s biography of Ebrahim says visitors included
Nelson Mandela, Al Gore, Queen Beatrice of the Netherlands, Morgan Freeman, and
Michelle Obama. 

But most of all, “he was a very caring father,”
Igsaak said.

The museum, which not only keeps memories of District Six
alive but also is actively involved in lobbying for the return of original
residents, almost closed during the Covid-19 pandemic. 

Artists and supporters rallied to prevent this, and finally,
Covid relief funding came in, along with donations, in an ongoing fund-raising
campaign.

READ | Unrestituted: District Six’s oldest resident dies at the age
of 100 while waiting to return

Ebrahim died on Friday night. 

On YouTube, his gift of sharing lived memories of the forced
removals is shown in a poignant clip about his early love of racing
pigeons. 

He tells the story of how a neighbour promised him 50
pigeons when he turned 17 and how he and a group of friends prepared a coop for
their arrival. 

After they were forcibly removed to Athlone in 1974 from
their house in Caledon Street, which cuts past the Cape Town Central police
station, he released the pigeons, but they flew back to his razed house and
waited in the remains of what once was their home for their food. 

Voice of the Cape community radio station manager Goolam
Fakier said it had been “an honour and privilege to have worked with
Ebrahim.”

He said:

Chris Julius of the District Six Museum said in a brief
Facebook post: “Our beloved Noor Ebrahim has passed away, and for the
moment, we want to take the time to acknowledge very briefly how much he meant
to us. We don’t yet have all the words.”