The Auwal Mosque dates back to 1794, when the Muslim Faith was brought to South Africa by slaves from the East. The property was owned by Salie Coridon of Ceylon, a freed slave whose daughter married Achmat of Bengal, who later inherited the property and subsequently made it available to the Muslim community to be used as a mosque.
The story goes; Iman Abdullah Kadi Salaam, an Indonesian prince was banished to Robben Island for conspiring with the English against the Dutch. "During his incarceration he was said to have written out several copies of the Koran from memory, and upon his release in 1793, he established a madrasa (Islamic school) in Dorp Street. Five years later one of his students, Achmat van Bengalen, gave one of his properties to him", which became the Auwal Mosque in 1798. Only two of the original walls remain after it collapsed in the 1930's.
It is the oldest mosque in the country.
Info from TimeOut & Cape>gateway.
