“Celebrating the Life of the Human Rights Advocate”
Programme Director
The Mandela Family
MEC of Sport, Recreation, Arts and Culture, Ms Tom
CEO of the Nelson Mandela Museum, Mr Mpumlwana
Representatives from the German Development Bank
Representatives from the Government of Saxony
The Board of the Nelson Mandela Museum
Members of the uMthatha Community present here today
Community Leaders and Members of the Traditional Leadership
Members of the Media in our midst
Comrades and Friends
Fellow South Africans
Ladies and Gentlemen
Yesterday, the Mandela Family and the Nelson Mandela Museum (NMM) commemorated the Human Rights Day by celebrating the 22 years of the release of Dr Nelson Mandela from apartheid prisons. They decided to use this day to mark the 22 years of Mandela as a free man in the country of his birth as well as celebrating 12 years of the establishment of the Nelson Mandela Museum.
Again we are gathered here to honour Nelson Mandela’s years of freedom since 1990 and also take this opportunity to thank him for his role in shaping the democratic dispensation in South Africa.
I am rejuvenated to see young and old people of the Eastern Cape Province taking part in the “Freedom Walk” organised by the NMM and their partners as a symbol of the ‘Long Road to Freedom’ that Madiba have gone through many years ago.
It is therefore with a great pleasure and joy for me to deliver this message to you immediately after these important celebrations in our country including the celebrations that took place in Qunu. I would like to use this opportunity provided to me by the Nelson Mandela Museum and share some important lessons with you about the ‘long road to freedom’ that have been walked by people like Mandela.
Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me on behalf of the ANC government to thank you and the people of uMthatha for inviting me to this auspicious event to address you today. Allow me, also, to pay tribute to the millions of people of this part of our country who contributed immensely in the struggle to liberate South Africa.
It is particularly important that we all pay tribute to Tata Nelson Rholihlahla Mandela for his immeasurable contribution in the fight against apartheid, for which he paid the ultimate price of serving 27 years in jail for his role in the struggle for freedom and liberty.
As Madiba was a sportsman, it is befitting for us to welcome and thank the German Development Bank for its donation of Sport facility here in the Oliver Tambo District Municipality. This initiative will help us to bridge the gaps between rural and urban communities through sport and recreation activities.
As we launched the Schools Sport in 2011, these facilities provide an opportunity for all our young people to participate meaningfully in the schools sport programme and practice sport in this facility.
The initiative to donate sport facility and sport equipments in rural and neglected communities is a direct response to the dreams of Nelson Mandela and it speaks directly to the values of this icon.
Tata Mandela grew up in these areas and his footprints are drawn from the suffering and pain of these communities. That is why, the Nelson Mandela Heritage Trail or Footprints is a direct replica of the Liberation Root of our people towards a better life for all.
This Liberation Root involves selfless struggles of our people to liberate themselves from political and economic bondages.
It was under the leadership of Nelson Mandela that the African National Congress (ANC) finally adopted a radical stance against the White Minority regime. The ANC was persuaded to adopt radical and cutting-edge resolutions that saw the ultimate advancement of the people’s war against the white minority regime.
It was in Mandela’s time that the struggle for people’s power reached high proportions and became rooted in the masses of our people. This was when the ANC decided to establish the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) in 1944 and adopting its 1949 Programme of Action, and ultimately launched the Defiance Campaign in 1952.
At this time Mandela and others sort to radicalise the struggle for liberation and turned the ANC into a mass organisation, including the formation of Umkhonto Wesizwe in 1961.
We are, therefore, gathered here today to reflect on this difficult road marched by Tata Nelson Mandela in his quest for decolonisation and independence of South Africa. We are here to remind ourselves on the road traversed by these freedom fighters and their sacrifices in the struggle for the liberation of our country.
As it is exhibited by the Nelson Mandela Museum, Tata Mandela possesses a rich history of selflessness and collective leadership. He did not involve himself in the fight against apartheid for personal glory. In all his conduct in the struggle, Mandela made sure that he was with his people. In whatever he did, he put the interest of the people before his personal ambitions.
His attitude to the conduct of struggle is embedded in his statement in his defence in the Rivonia Trial in 1962. His defence statement raised the following:
“In my youth in the Transkei, I listened to the elders of my tribe telling stories of the old days. Amongst the tales they related to me were those of wars fought by our ancestors in defense of the fatherland. The names of Dingane and Bambatha, Hintsa and Makana, Squngthi and Danasile, Moshoeshoe and Sekhukhuni, were praised as the glory of the entire African nation.
I hoped then that life might offer me the opportunity to serve my people and make my own humble contribution to their freedom struggle. This is what has motivated me in all that I have done in relation to the charges made against me in this case”.
It is therefore, in this regard that this Museum is used as an epitome of the journey travelled by Madiba from his childhood years as a young boy in the village of Qunu into a grown man walking in the streets of Johannesburg as the leader of the ANC Youth League and the ANC.
This Museum is the theatre of the struggles of the South African masses led by Nelson Mandela reflecting their sacrifices and advancements in the struggle for the liberation of our country. This precinct takes everyone through the memory lane of a nation in making with all its inherent contradictions, finally reaching its full sovereignty and nationhood in 1994.It also reflects on the legacy of Madiba in the first five years of the democratic rule in a free South Africa.
Arguably, one of the biggest tests of the Mandela’s political leadership and character between 1990 and 1994 was the assassination of Chris Hani on April 10, 1993, hardly few months after the Boipatong massacre where in both events Nelson Mandela had to serene the entire nation and assures us of the non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous future. At this time, Mandela did not spur a moment to remind the apartheid colonial regime of the necessity to possess integrity and fast-track negotiations and effect change.
This test of a formidable character and decisive leadership was witnessed in his astute political and economic supervision of the entire period between 1990 (when liberation movements were unbanned and political prisoners released) and 1994 (when South Africa held its first all-inclusive democratic elections).
Madiba became the President of South Africa before he was even officially elected and declared President of the Republic of South Africa in 1994.Mandela presided over the most difficult and challenging period in the history of the pre and post-apartheid South Africa.
All these values and principles live up to the life and times of Mandela. In celebrating his legacy, let us all drink in his fountain of forgiveness and collectively emulate his example and leadership style.
From his time as a youth leaguer, Madiba new that the African Grievance in South Africa presented itself as the most dominant social force in the face of our political discourse. Even when he became the first President of the democratic South Africa, Mandela knew that the challenges facing our people continue to present themselves as the most dominant social category of the new South Africa. He knew and understood that we could not isolate the socio-political struggle from the struggle for economic emancipation.
In his address at the Parliament of the Republic of Ireland, Dublin on 2 July 1990; Nelson Mandela reminded the world that:
“The struggle we are waging is also for the economic transformation of our country. The system to which we are heirs was designed and operates for the benefit of the white minority at the expense of the black majority. Clearly the situation cannot be allowed to continue in which millions know nothing but the corrosive ache of hunger, in which countless numbers of children die as a result diseases of poverty”.
He knew and lived under poverty in his youth, and understood well that the ANC government should prioritise education, health, and employment as well as eradication of poverty if we want to uplift the standard of living of the majority of our people and be able to fight all the main social factors that continue to undermine the work of the state.
Madiba also used sport as a tool to inspire our people through his leadership in the process to lobby the world leaders to support the South African bid to host the first 2010 FIFA World Cup in Africa and managed to use sport as an instrument to unite Africa and put our continent high on the agenda of the world.
In this instance, the hosting of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, which Mandela advocated for, was a watershed achievement in the history of South Africa and contributed immensely in building unity in our country.
It was a reminder to the world of how far this once-divided country has come in throwing off the shackles of apartheid and presenting itself as a non-racial and multi-cultural society.
His presence in the World Cup Finals was also a poignant reminder of the role sport can play in bringing about change as it possesses the power to transform individuals and the world.
In this context, the Museum should also exhibit such a historical achievement as part of tata Madiba’s Legacy. In should in the same context exhibit Mandela’s days as Boxer in South Africa and role Boxing played in the 1980s to rally our people in the struggle for freedom. This makes us to think of Boxing Matches that involved the likes of “Big” John Tate and Gerry Cotzee and others that mobilised our people for a non-racial sport as well as showcasing the role of other sports in the changing South Africa.
Not withstanding his spirit of Ubuntu. Mandela has been at the forefront in the struggle for humanity, humility, solidarity and sacrifice. He fought against the apartheid doctrine that rested on conflict, racial discrimination, tribalism and ethnicity, exploitation, apathy and sexism. In this regard, he presided over a system that replaced such a backward doctrine with democratic structures whose sole aim was to reconcile, unify, and inculcate patriotism, nation building and social cohesion.
We should be reminded that before finding fame as a driving force of South Africa’s struggle for freedom, Mandela began his career as a Lawyer and soon became distracted by his growing disgust at the country’s laws of racial discrimination and decided to commit himself to fight for the improvement of the social conditions of his people.
Therefore, this Museum should also be used to teach young people about the principles of Ubuntu. It should strive to educate all young South Africans about human sacrifice and human solidarity, and to commit themselves to build a more caring and ethical society.
It should enable the youth to gain knowledge about the struggle of our people whilst at the same time situates inequality and poverty in South Africa as a matter rooted in the erosion of public morality.
To a large extent, this Museum should present a people-centred view of development, learning from the experience of Mandela, prioritising moral leadership and linking the struggle for change to the struggle for human rights.
This will help this institution to assist society to fight against any erosion of social solidarity, cohesion and trust and set the scene for a more caring and ethical society that Nelson Mandela fought for in his whole life.
Hence, we regard this museum to be a symbol of the struggle that Mandela was engaged in, and that our youth should be pre-occupied to learn about the values that Madiba stood for.
It should assist society to fight against the current ‘quasi-racist moral discourse’, a dangerous phenomenon that paints everything being done by the ANC government as immoral and corrupt.
In doing so, this museum will quell the notion that our learning institutions continue to produce graduates who are schooled in out-dated views about development and the contribution of social sciences in the development discourse.
Thank you.
