Nelson Mandela: A rare breed

18^th July, Nelson Mandela's birthday was gazetted by the UN as Mandela day in 2009 and celebrated for the first time in 2010. 67 minutes of charity are encouraged in honour of Mandela's 67 years of fighting for social, political and economic justice. 

That is in a small part, the size of Nelson Mandela. When he turned 95 (the last age he would live to) I had wanted to put up a blog in tribute to this great son of Africa, but I couldn't find the words for this great man. I had nothing to write about the man so I decided to just reproduce the lyrics to John Clegg’s famous song Asimbonanga. When he died I equally didn’t have anything to write, so I decided to just share some famous pictures of Mandela and some of his famous quotes.

However, on the first Mandela day since his death, I've decided to discuss some aspects of this extra ordinary life as I have experienced it many kilometers away having never met the man or even been close as being within a 100 kilometers to where he may have been at any moment. But that was the influence of Nelson Mandela, you didn't need to be near him, you just felt his influence. 

Very few can deny that Madiba, as he was fondly called by his clan name, was a rare breed. I first came to know that there was a human being called Nelson Mandela in the late 80's when I was a very young boy. My friend's young brother who is my friend too and a family friend happened to be named Nelson. Funny enough, this Nelson, the other name Muyaba, many years later would be on my wedding ceremony bridal party. Without digressing, the story is that I had heard a few people refer to Nelson Muyaba as Nelson Mandela. 

So when I heard Nelson Mandela being mentioned a couple of times by many people who were older, I always wondered why my friend was called that too. My elder brothers would later explain to me that Nelson Mandela was a freedom fighter imprisoned for demanding equality and an end to apartheid. Aged just five, six or seven, the terms freedom fighter, equality and apartheid did not really bring any serious meaning home. However, there were a number of South African songs that depicted the fight against apartheid that were being played on Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC) TV and since some of the songs were too 'graphic', I started to fill the gaps in my understanding of apartheid. 

Then one day I sat down in front of the TV to watch the movie Sarafina, the epic film that stared Whoopi Goldberg, and my respect for the anti apartheid activists sky rocketed. There were many names that constantly made headlines, and my memory recalls the names Walter Sisulu and Oliver Tambo. Of all the anti apartheid activists and freedom fighters the name Nelson Mandela was one that sent the greatest repulsive waves across the world. Free Mandela was the common chorus out of Africa, Latin America, Asia Europe and just throughout the world. A FREE man, is what Mandela became on 11th February 1990.

Upon his release from prison, Mandela's first visit was Zambia where many of the Africa National Congress (ANC) activists who had fled the jaws of apartheid and fear of jail found refuge. Though I was quite young then, I still remember how big an occasion Mandela's coming to Zambia was. The preceding year had also seen the visit to Zambia, of Pope John Paul II which was another big occasion I remember.

While many people much older than me remember the Mandela of the 60's who was imprisoned for 27 years, many from my generation only remember the Mandela that came out of Prison. He was an ageing man but very much a self assured man who believed in himself and his way of things but never shied away from changing course every time he realized he was on the wrong side. He also had a tinge of arrogance about him but at the same time showed he was a humble man. One thing he did do after his release from prison was to embark on an extensive international travelling expedition where he addressed many forums including the OAU, World economic Forum, and many other summits as well as receiving various peace prizes together with F W de Klerk. However, while visiting the Scandinavian countries and Czechoslovakia in May 1992, Mandela shocked the world when his confrontational side emerged once more by suggesting that F W de Klerk was personally responsible for the political violence in South Africa at the time. 

He likened the violence in South Africa to the killing of Jews in Nazi Germany. Mandela also criticised what he felt was the stranglehold imposed on the South African press, which represented White-owned conglomerates. This attack had shocked many as Mandela had mostly taken the role of mediator of the different political factions in South Africa and signing many peace accords. Perhaps it was the case of 'old habits die hard', as he was one of the founders of the ANC military wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe.

In the time Mandela was in jail, there had emerged a cadre of youth who had lived through the struggle years and they believed in violence and confrontation as the number one solution in order to achieve anything. Most of these saw Mandela as having been softened by jail and did not approve of his no-violence stance. In April, 1993 Mandela was booed at a rally in Soweto’s Jabulani stadium when he tried to convey a message of peace and restraint following the assassination of Chris Hani.

Mandela also caused a political row after he had been voted ANC president to replace the ailing Oliver Tambo when he suggested that South Africa's voting age should be lowered to enable 14-year old children to vote.

As it turned out, Mandela would be the first president of a democratic election in South Africa barely 4 years after release from prison. Mandela's 27 years in prison I can imagine were dominated by tremendous hardship. There were freezing winter nights, suffocating summer days, poorly if not barely cooked food and back-breaking labor. On cold winter nights, a thin mat which has now found itself in a museum served as a bed, on a stone floor for most of his time behind bars. Winnie Madikizela Mandela had been to see her husband a restricted number of times only. In that same period he lost his First born Son & his mother but was not allowed to attend each of their funerals! In addition, none of his children was allowed to visit him in jail. In those 27 years there were moments of high drama, including aborted escape plans (Michael Scorfield Prison Break stunts).

Nelson Mandela is a rare breed not because he spent 27 years in jail, but because besides undergoing so much - he chose to forgive. That is not what other African freedom fighters did. The early freedom fighters became demi-gods in their own countries with most of them throwing out of the window all the democratic tenets they preached and putting on the entire dictatorial amour they sought to rid from their colonial masters.

Nelson Mandela chose a different path, embracing forgiveness, reconciliation as well as choosing not to keep hold of power for eternity. Perhaps he had the advantage of seeing what had happened to the other freedom fighter before him who held onto power for many years until they became irrelevant or their own citizens didn't want them anymore there by being humiliated out of office and a new breed of African leaders emerging in the 90’s. Some have even suggested that at the age of 76 when he was elected as president, Mandela didn't have enough fight left in him hence he chose to forgive all his oppressors, aggressors and enemies so that he could live his final years in peace.

Whatever the rationale behind his choices which led to the decisions of forgiveness and reconciliation, nothing can be taken away from his desire for a just society. In his own words, in court before sentencing in 1964, he chose these word; "During my lifetime I have dedicated myself to this struggle of the African people. I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons will live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for. But, my lord, if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die."

Mandela's pre-occupation was not to change the skin colour of the ruling elite from white and replace with black. His ideology was to bring forth a democratic dispensation where ideals of the rule of law, one man one vote, equality and a free press were truly present. To him it didn't matter who was in power as long as the system promoted the ideals of equality. He didn't need to rule forever to make this happen. He just happened to have been the conduit through which the Republic of South Africa buried the hewers of hate and drawers of colour on one side and those who wield mastery over the countries resources on the other.

In 1999, after only a single term in office, Mandela handed over first the ANC presidency to Thabo Mbeki. He would later choose not to contest the Republican presidency, again paving the way for Thabo Mbeki to be elected president. At the time Mandela stepped down as republican president I was away at boarding school and we didn't get much news then, but Mandela stepping down was news that filtered through to us at a time when internet was not much developed in this part of the world.

I remember when I heard the news I was shocked! After all the years in jail, the least we could have expected him was to complete his mandatory two terms. We have seen other even try to subvert constitutions by going for a third term of office. This is what set him apart. He didn't want to rule for 27 years as compensation for being in jail. This is my greatest memory of Mandela. It was a first in my life time. We had gotten used to the likes of Kamuzu Banda and Kenneth Kaunda who had to lose an election in order to cede power.

In my younger days, much earlier I the 90’s, we would refer to Kamuzu Banda as the Kaunda of Malawi. In other words Kaunda was the term for president. “Who is the Kaunda of country X or country Y?”, we would ask each other. All the great sons of Africa who brought us freedom have been special in their own respective ways. Kwame Nkruma, Mobutu Seseseko, Julius Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda, Samora Machel, Kamuzu Banda and many others, but Mandela was more relevant to my time. His relevance has made him all the more, a rare breed among his peers. Sixty seven years of fighting for social justice, and not even making any fortune out of it. Truly a rare breed.