APRIL 28, 2025 — As South Africa marked Freedom Day yesterday, Eastern Cape artist Thembani Hastings Mqhayi, who claims to be the original creator of the country’s national flag, renewed his call for recognition and threatened to pursue legal action if his demands are not addressed, says Independent Online.
Freedom Day commemorates the country’s first democratic elections in 1994, along with the adoption of a new constitution and the replacement of the apartheid-era flag, according to the SA People News.
The current national flag, officially adopted on 27 April 1994, has since become a symbol of South Africa’s democratic transition.
Mqhayi, who claims to have submitted five original designs early in 1994 after a public call by Nelson Mandela for citizen contributions, argues that one of his submissions was used without his consent.
He asserts that he no longer has copies of the designs because they were mailed through the East London Post Office and he did not keep duplicates.
This is not the first time Mqhayi has pursued the matter legally.
In 2022, he filed papers in the High Court in Pretoria against then-Minister of Sport, Arts and Culture Nathi Mthethwa and the State Herald, accusing the late Frederick Brownell of plagiarism.
Brownell, who served as State Herald from 1982 to 2002 and is officially credited with designing the flag, passed away in 2019. His role in designing the flag has been widely recognized, but Mqhayi contends that his intellectual property was misappropriated.
The Department of Sport, Arts and Culture has previously denied Mqhayi’s claims and declined to participate in recent interviews about the dispute.
Image: Privatemusings, CC BY-SA 2.5
