Eric Abraham (producer)

Abraham was born in the Wynberg area of Cape Town and grew up in Rondebosch. His father was a naval commander who had arrived in South Africa from Hungary before World War II to escape antisemitism. Abraham attended South African College High School. He participated in school productions and ran a film society. He later received a Spectemur Agendo Award from the school in 2019 for his contributions to civil liberties and the performing arts.

Abraham studied Law at the University of Cape Town, but has said he was "hardly ever at lectures because there was something more important in those days" as a student union leader and activist. He began his career in journalism, setting up the South African News Agency (SANA) as a correspondent on human rights abuses and black politics in South Africa for the foreign press such as the BBC and The Guardian. He was placed under a five-year banning order and house arrest by the Apartheid government in 1976 for his reporting. After receiving death threats, Abraham secretly fled to Botswana with external help in January 1977. He could not return to his home country until Apartheid ended, and was granted political asylum in the UK. He landed a job as a producer for BBC Panorama.

Eric Abraham (born March 1954) is a South African-British producer and former journalist and activist. Born and raised in South Africa, he moved to England in 1977 where he lived in exile for 15 years for his reporting in opposition to the Apartheid government in the press. He has since worked in theatre and screen, co-founding the London-based Portobello Productions as well as Cape Town's Isango Portobello and Fugard Theatre.