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In four by-elections this week, the DA and the IFP had important holds with the DA retaining its seats in Tshwane and Modimolle, while the IFP had to fend off a serious challenge from the ANC in uMvoti.
Celicia with her niece Tylo Boshoff-Serenata.
(Photo: Supplied)
Celicia Serenata grew up in Klerksdorp and was educated on politics in the belly of the apartheid beast, the University of Potchefstroom, a source of endless teasing by her friends through the ages. She got thrust into policy politics in the Department of Health, and she helped draft the initial government plan to roll out antiretrovirals, conceived in secret backroom meetings that never took place in Sandton, Pretoria and the ghastly airport conference centers out of the eye of the denialist politicians of the time.
We have all dined out on so many stories from those times, of her endless tales of then Minister of Health, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, including the bizarre midnight phone calls of “where is Nono Simelela?” (to which she always wanted to say “woman, unless you think that Nono is sleeping next to me, how the do you expect me to know”) and “where is my speech?”, her meeting Bill Clinton,