WeeklySA_AdminDistinguished: Dr Pinky Modise’s legacy of dedication and compassion will live on in the countless lives she touched
By Ali Mphaki
In a few months time Dr Motlalekgomo Mirriam Pinky Modise would have been celebrating her 80th birthday.
Born on November 12, 1954, the daughter of the late ANC/MK stalwart Joe Modise and his wife Eva Modise, Pinky as she was affectionately known, succumbed to colon cancer on June 26. She was 79.
As fate had decreed, Pinky spent her youthful years far away from her home in Dube, Soweto, criss-crossing the length and breadth of the continent with her father, a fugitive/terrorist in exile planning and leading a guerilla movement against the mighty apartheid state machinery .
Its purely a matter of conjecture how the young Pinky navigated her way to adulthood in those trying exile circumstances, save to say she had the knack to realise that education is the first step towards self-liberation.
Most probably due to the “historic” links between the USSR and her father’s guerilla movement, Pinky found herself at the University of the USSR Kharkov State, where she went on to earn her Bachelor’s degree in Russian language and later completed her Bachelor of Medicine from the Moscow Medical Institute in 1984.
Armed with her medical degree “to help cure her oppressed people”, unfortunately could not come to South Africa because of the apartheid laws and had to settle for an internship at the ministry of health in Sierra Leon (1984 -1986) and then served as a medical practitioner from 1987 to 1990 which included a five-month tenure at Amsdale Clinic in Lusaka, Zambia.
With the winds of change blowing in South Africa and following the unbanning of political movements like the ANC,PAC etc. in the early nineties, it was time for Dr Pinky to head back home to South Africa to her home and people she had so much longed to serve.
Back home in South Africa she landed a job at the Johannesburg City Council where she held the role of principal medical officer, a position she occupied from 1991 to 2008.
Not one to sit on her laurels Dr Pinky continued to upgrade her qualifications completing several advanced courses including HIV Counselling, HIV and AIDS management, managing TB from Tokyo University, as well as management certificates from Tambo Memorial and basic resuscitation from South Rand hospital, where she served until her retirement in 2019.
For those who were under her care most would attest to her unwavering commitment to her patients and contribution to the medical field, particularly in the areas of HIV and TB management.
For those she came across in her daily life, she was always humble and ready to give an ear.
If you didn’t know her, never would you imagine she was the daughter of the late Joe Modise. She was compassion personified.
Dr Pinky is survived by her two children David and Lerato, her sister Thoko and several grandchildren.
Funeral service is on Saturday from 8.30am to 11,30 am at Our Lady of Fatima Catholic church in Dube.
Robala ka kgotso!
