MANDELA – THE PASSING OF A GOOD MAN
Yes, Mandela was such a man. Not only was he great in politics, he was also a philosopher. There are many prescient sayings, fit for sages of the millennia past, that are attributed to him and can be found all over his autobiography Long Walk to Freedom. These quotes will spice up this tribute.“Education is […]
Yes, Mandela was such a man. Not only was he great in politics, he was also a philosopher. There are many prescient sayings, fit for sages of the millennia past, that are attributed to him and can be found all over his autobiography Long Walk to Freedom. These quotes will spice up this tribute.
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
The ONLY reason why the West is so enamoured of Mandela is that, like the Reverend Martin Luther King Junior before him, he turned the other cheek and did not call for ‘an eye for an eye’ like Malcolm X (AbdulMalik Shabazz) did. Despite reforming his call later in life, Brother Malcolm was vilified and is still being vilified by Whites who oppressed him and Mandela and Rev. King. The Whites jailed Mandela for a generation, and murdered Rev. King. But today the two are celebrated by Whitedom as the greatest blacks that ever lived.
“When a man is denied the right to live the life he believes in, he has no choice but to become an outlaw.”
There is so much hypocrisy in the world, especially by the West. This is the same man once vilified by the West. Writing in the Daily Beast this Friday (thedailybeast.com), Peter Beinart says: “Now that he’s dead, and can cause no more trouble, Nelson Mandela is being mourned across the ideological spectrum as a saint. But not long ago, in Washington’s highest circles, he was considered an enemy of the United States…In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan placed Mandela’s African National Congress on America’s official list of “terrorist” groups. In 1985, then-Congressman Dick Cheney voted against a resolution urging that he [Mandela] be released from jail…”
“If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.”
Yes, Mandela was a great man. But there are perhaps three areas which many commentators, especially Western, will not touch. These are Mandela’s friendship with late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi; Mandela’s identification with the Palestinian cause; and Mandela’s perhaps only crime to this writer – having to let wife Winnie go.
We will never turn our back on Gaddafi.”
In late October 1997, Mandela visited Gaddafi’s Libya, snubbing U.S.-led Western-imposed sanctions on the North African country. Greeting Gaddafi with a hug and a kiss on each cheek, Mandela told him: “My brother leader, my brother leader. How nice to see you.” Shortly afterwards, he told reporters he remained unimpressed by U.S. opposition to his mission, adding: “Those who say I should not be here are without morals. I am not going to join them in their lack of morality. This man helped us at a time when we were all alone, when those who say we should not come here were helping the enemy (South Africa’s white government).
That was indeed brave for, at that time, even leaders of neighbouring Arab countries such as Mubarak of Egypt had to seek the leave of then U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to shake Gaddafi’s hand; and the Saudi American government had the temerity to turn back Libyan planes conveying pilgrims to Hajj, for fear of American backlash. But Mandela (and many African leaders before and after him) tore those sanctions into shreds.
“We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.”
On Palestine, Mandela had said: “The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is not just an issue of military occupation and Israel is not a country that was established ‘normally’ and happened to occupy another country in 1967. Palestinians are not struggling for a ‘state’ but for freedom, liberation and equality, just like we were struggling for freedom in South Africa…The so-called ‘Palestinian autonomous areas’ are Bantustans. These are restricted entities within the power structure of the Israeli apartheid system…Apartheid is a crime against humanity. Israel has deprived millions of Palestinians of their liberty and property. It has perpetuated a system of gross racial discrimination and inequality. “
“Israeli Apartheid is a crime against humanity.”
In a Memo to renowned pro-Israel American commentator Thomas Friedman on Palestine in March 2001, Mandela said: “Israel has deprived millions of Palestinians of their liberty and property. It has perpetuated a system of gross racial discrimination and inequality. It has systematically incarcerated and tortured thousands of Palestinians, contrary to the rules of international law. It has, in particular, waged a war against a civilian population, in particular children…Thomas, I’m not abandoning Mideast diplomacy. But I’m not going to indulge you the way your supporters do. If you want peace and democracy, I will support you. If you want formal Apartheid, we will not support you. If you want to support racial discrimination and ethnic cleansing, we will oppose you. When you figure out what you’re about, give me a call.”
“Lead from the back — and let others believe they are in front.”
In a 1986 interview, four years before Nelson was released from prison, Winnie narrated her pain, frustration and anguish: “All I know is I am terribly brutalised inside. I know my soul is scarred, I know I am bleeding inside all the time. I know the pain of my people’s suffering, the pain of having a husband behind bars for 25 years, the pain of bringing up children under the atmosphere I brought them up, [it] is so great inside…But what has happened is that [it] hasn’t brutalised me to an extent of being consumed in hate.”
If Mandela could have forgiven South African whites for what they did to him, for what they did to all blacks for centuries, for what they continue to do in the economy, there was no reason he couldn’t turn the other cheek for Winnie. For this writer, perhaps the lowest Winnie would ever reach was when she wasn’t invited to share the podium with her then-estranged husband Nelson Mandela on his Inauguration in 1994 as the first democratically-elected president of South Africa. In her place, one of her daughters was by the Madiba’s side. But again, Winnie was to rise in 1999 when Thabo Mbeki (Nelson’s successor) personally invited her to sit with him and his wife at his own Inauguration as President. Winnie had found a way to survive again.
Many, including this writer, are of the opinion that, if there ever was arguably one mistake Nelson Mandela, the Madiba and former husband of Winnie did, was separating from this woman, the sole person who kept the Mandela name alive and the torch of the struggle alight, for the nearly three decades Nelson was incarcerated by the white-minority apartheid regime of South Africa. Once Mandela was in prison, Winnie felt that she must take up the fight to try to end apartheid in South Africa. At the age of 26 she was left alone with her two daughters aged only 4 and 5. The security forces recognised the possible significance of her role and placed her under constant observation.
Many argue, and this writer among them, that for Mandela the man to have been so forgiving of the Whites after the real Independence of 1994, he should have given the other cheek to all the real and perceived mistakes of Nelson, (with hindsight, our hindsight perhaps) should have eschewed, should have persevered and should have been more patient with this great woman, Winnie.
Yes, Mandela was a great man. He was a good man. But he was not a perfect man.