Brighton charity chief from South Africa pays tribute to Mandela

By Andy Winter, chief executive of Brighton Housing Trust (BHT)

Madiba, the Father of the Nation, is no longer with us. For most South Africans, at home and abroad, this is a moment that we have dreaded but, in recent years, and in particular recent days, have become prepared for. Nelson Mandela is dead.

From my bedroom window for most of my teenage years, growing up in Cape Town, I could see Robben Island, but it wasn’t until I arrived in the UK in 1979 that I first saw a photograph of its most famous prisoner. Nelson Mandela’s image was banned in apartheid South Africa, a prison sentence awaiting those who reproduced or possessed it.

In the 1960s, 70s and 80s, few would have predicted that a peaceful transition would be achieved from apartheid to democracy, nor that a single individual, long out of public view, serving a life sentence for acts of terrorism, would be the catalyst for change.

Nelson Mandela

Many people tend to forget that Mandela did, indeed, lead the armed struggle and was responsible for planting bombs. One former British Prime Minister is alleged to have described Mandela as “that grubby little terrorist”. But, as they say, one person’s ‘terrorist’ is another person’s freedom fighter. And Mandela was the freedom fighter of all freedom fighters.

At this moment, when the world rightly reflects on the passing of one of the greatest figures of the modern era, and rightfully pays homage for his dignity, his courage and his willingness to forgive, it is worth remembering he had his shortcomings, and today’s corrupt ANC government is also part of his legacy.

A true monument to Mandela, himself without an ounce of corruption, is to build on the legacy of the Rainbow Nation, by routing out the corruption that is endemic throughout the new ruling class in South Africa, and which is holding back the cause of fairness and freedom.

But, along with my fellow South Africans and all right-minded people throughout the world, I am grieving for a simple man and for the Father of the Nation.

Above my desk in my room at BHT, I have a giant election poster of Mandela. My brother, Simon, removed it from a lamp post the day after Mandela was elected our first President in 1994. Tomorrow, as I do every day, I will look at that poster and the giant face of Mandela. I will probably look at it for a little longer than usual, and I will again thank him for what he has done for my beloved country, and for the world.