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IN 1964, NELSON Mandela, the leader of the African National Congress, was sentenced to prison.
He would spend 18 years in the notorious Robben Island, six in Pollsmoor Prison and just over a year in Victor Verster Prison.
On 11 February, 1990, he finally walked free.
On his release he gave a searing speech calling for reconciliation with South Africa’s white minority.
“I stand here before you not as a prophet but as a humble servant of you, the people. Your tireless and heroic sacrifices have made it possible for me to be here today. I therefore place the remaining years of my life in your hands.
It is only through disciplined mass action that our victory can be assured. We call on our white compatriots to join us in the shaping of a new South Africa. The freedom movement is a political home for you too. We call on the international community to continue the campaign to isolate the apartheid regime. To lift sanctions now would be to run the risk of aborting the process towards the complete eradication of apartheid.Our march to freedom is irreversible. We must not allow fear to stand in our way. Universal suffrage on a common voters` role in a united democratic and non-racial South Africa is the only way to peace and racial harmony.
In conclusion I wish to quote my own words during my trial in 1964. They are true today as they were then:
`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 live together in harmony and with equal opportunities.
It is an ideal which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.’
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A great man
A great man whose supporters were gunned down by an apartheid racist regime, supplied with weapons by Armscor. The same Armscor who were authorised by that horrible regime to supply weapons to the sectarian loyalist gangs up north to go on their rampages against innocent Catholics!
Yeah only the IRA should have been allowed weapons in order to shoot innocent protestants, it’s shocking that other groups were allowed weapons at all.
Legend
The South African Gerry Adams.
Does everything have to be about Sinn Fein?
Yes, yes it does.
Yeah Gerry spent years and years in prison for fighting oppression admitted to his originally violent ways, completely changed his ways forgiving those who imprisoned him and then proceeded to lead his country with the dignity and decorum of the great…it’s Nelson Mandela this article is about not Winnie
At least Nelson admitted who he stood for not like your man who forgets everything from his sordid past.
He did great things to reconcile the country after his release, he abandoned violence and didn’t seek vengeance against the white minority. It’s a great shame that his work is being undone by the woefully corrupt ANC government.
Call me a killjoy but why was he sentenced to prison?
From what I understand there was good reason.
He did great things but least not forget the terrible things he did. The terrible things he encouraged.
He was repeatedly imprisoned by a minority undemocratic apartheid regime. Such “sentencing” had zero credibility.
Quote:
Nelson Mandela was the head of UmKhonto we Sizwe, (MK), the terrorist wing of the ANC and South African Communist Party. At his trial, he had pleaded guilty to 156 acts of public violence including mobilising terrorist bombing campaigns, which planted bombs in public places, including the Johannesburg railway station. Many innocent people, including women and children, were killed by Nelson Mandela’s MK terrorists. Here are some highlights
-Church Street West, Pretoria, on the 20 May 1983
-Amanzimtoti Shopping complex KZN, 23 December 1985
-Krugersdorp Magistrate’s Court, 17 March 1988
-Durban Pick ‘n Pay shopping complex, 1 September 1986
-Pretoria Sterland movie complex 16 April 1988 – limpet mine killed ANC terrorist M O Maponya instead
-Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court, 20 May 1987
-Roodepoort Standard Bank 3 June, 1988
Tellingly, not only did Mandela refuse to renounce violence, Amnesty refused to take his case stating “[the] movement recorded that it could not give the name of ‘Prisoner of Conscience’ to anyone associated with violence, even though as in ‘conventional warfare’ a degree of restraint may be exercised.”
Don’t be mentioning that to the extreme left or socialists on this site.
You can only be a terrorist if you are white, American or British and from a wealthy background.
Everyone else is considered a revolutionary, Comrade.
Read his book, try to understand the subtleties involved.
He was imprisoned from 1962-1989 after a political show trial. He had little or no contact with the outside world. You’ve listed events from the 1980s.
Amnesty is hardly the globe’s moral barometer, although they did make Mandela an Ambassador of Conscience subsequently. You’re in the same school of thought as Thatcher.
I remember the day he was released so well. I knew history was unfolding before my very eyes.
But I couldnt help but feel cheated that they interrupted the Beatbox on Network 2 to do it..
Unless they were already smuggling brick-size cellphones into prisons on an island off South Africa in the seventies and eighties, it’s unlikely he masterminded much of the “terrorism”.
Actually I’m good friends with a number of South Africans, ones who lived it and suffered. I will never read his book.
I thought Maggie Thatcher was dead and buried
Lilly, are these South African friends of yours white by any means? Let me go even further, with a Dutch surname?
Why does their skin colour matter to you, Juan?
It doesn’t mater to me, I think it matters to Lilly’s South African friends. Nice reading Gordon, you can read and understand English pretty well I see, you reply reflects it.
I have a souvenir replica key for his cell on Robben Island, if only they’d started selling those a few years earlier .
He is no Paul Murphy
You’re trying to compare the two? Paul has a hell of a long way to go.
You’re right
We all watched this in the school PE hall, think i was in 3rd class at the time.
Tough school you were in he was released on a Sunday.
Rotarua , maybe his school recorded it and played it for them on the Monday ?
It was meant as a joke Joan
And so was mine .rotaura .
It’s a pity all the great work by Nelson Mandela is now undone by President Jacob Zuma and the current ANC government. Reverse Apartheid, corruption and the genocide of the minority whites are now the order of the day.
Mandela negotiated the normal freedoms for all South Africans. These freedoms are the norm in any free country. De Klerk also negotiated equality freedoms for his people. By securing recognition of the Boers as an indigenous African tribe ( which they were not), the Boers were entitled to retain their property which they had taken from the Blacks. Mandela by accepting this ensured that what really matters remained in the control of the Boers. Over time a Black elite developed like Cyril Rhamaposa who had the brains to aggrandise themselves while at the same time complaining about the lack of land ownership by Blacks and lack of service provision. The difficulty around land redistribution is muddied by the fact that if Boer land was redistributed then other tribes like the Khoisans would also want the land redistributed from the Zulus ( who were the warlike imperialists before the Dutch or British arrived on the scene). In the Rainbow nation the various tribes share an uneasy coexistence because South Africa is a hybrid state which encompasses at least eleven other nations who could also have been separate states had history been different. The fact that the country has held together is a miracle in itself. There is an element of co-dependence within which a subtle apartheid undercurrent still exists like a glue holding the country together which is in itself a subtle paradox. The miracle is that Mandela’s persona and de Klerk’s practical negotiations created a peace.
Same day Mike Tyson lost to Buster Douglas headlines read Down picture of Tyson Out picture of Nelson
Never quiet understood what was soo great about him . Always thought he was overrated .
Who, Mandela or Tyson?
One of those memorable days. Remember watching Rodney Rice on the RTE as he walked free.
I didn’t even know Rodney Rice had been in prison.
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