East London Jewry mourned the passing last week of one of its most dedicated and distinguished communal leaders, Theo Blumberg. Until recently the community's representative on the SAJBD National Executive Council, Blumberg passed away in his home at the age of 91 late last Thursday night. He had been in ill health for a number of months, but remained active in local Jewish communal affairs almost until the end.

Towards the end of his long life, Blumberg's contributions both to Jewish communal affairs and the wider society were acknowledged through a series of prestigious awards.

These included the 2006 SA Jewish Report Lexus Lifetime Achiever Award, a special citation by the Eastern Cape Legislature for his work on behalf of the disabled in the province, a special Lifetime Achievement award from the SAJBD Cape Council and, most recently, a special long service award from the SAJBD National Executive Council in June this year. The latter was presented to him on the occasion of his finally stepping down as chairman of the Council for Border Jewry, in which capacity he had played a solo role for the past decade.

In addition to his work on the Board, Blumberg also single-handedly ran the East London IUA-UCF campaign and was an active member of the East London Hebrew Congregation. More widely, he took the lead in pioneering pre-primary facilities for deaf children at a time when no such facilities existed in the country.