Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela, President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was born in Transkei, South Africa on July 18, 1918. His father was Chief Henry Mandela of the Tembu Tribe. Mandela himself was educated at University College of Fort Hare and the University of Witwatersrand and qualified in law in 1942. He joined the African National Congress in 1944 and was engaged in resistance against the ruling National Party's apartheid policies after 1948. He went on trial for treason in 1956-1961 and was acquitted in 1961.

Umkhonto we Sizwe

After the banning of the ANC in 1960, Nelson Mandela argued for the setting up of a military wing within the ANC. In June 1961, the ANC executive considered his proposal on the use of violent tactics and agreed that those members who wished to involve themselves in Mandela's campaign would not be stopped from doing so by the ANC. This led to the formation of Umkhonto we Sizwe. Mandela was arrested in 1962 and sentenced to five years' imprisonment with hard labour. In 1963, when many fellow leaders of the ANC and the Umkhonto we Sizwe were arrested, Mandela was brought to stand trial with them for plotting to overthrow the government by violence. His statement from the dock received considerable international publicity. On June 12, 1964, eight of the accused, including Mandela, were sentenced to life imprisonment. From 1964 to 1982, he was incarcerated at Robben Island Prison, off Cape Town; thereafter, he was at Pollsmoor Prison, nearby on the mainland.

During his years in prison, Nelson Mandela's reputation grew steadily. He was widely accepted as the most significant black leader in South Africa and became a potent symbol of resistance as the anti-apartheid movement gathered strength. He consistently refused to compromise his political position to obtain his freedom.

Release from prison

In August 1988, Nelson Mandela was admitted to a luxury Cape Town clinic after contracting tuberculosis in Pollsmoor prison. On 7 December 1988, the Minister of Justice Kobie Coetsee announced that, following Mandela's complete recovery, he had been transferred to a "suitable, comfortable and properly secured home" adjacent to Victor Verster prison near the town of Paarl, some 30 miles from Cape Town. Thus, when Pan Am Flight 103 was sabotaged over Lockerbie in Scotland on 21 December 1988, the African National Congress (ANC) leader remained in custody as a prisoner. Nonetheless, the apartheid regime were quick to accuse Nelson Mandela and the ANC of masterminding the Lockerbie bombing. This amazing accusation was made on 11 January 1989 by South African Foreign Minister Pik Botha who had travelled to Stockholm in Sweden with other foreign dignitaries – including UN Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar – to attend the memorial service of United Nations Commissioner for Namibia, Bernt Carlsson, the highest profile victim of the 270 fatalities at Lockerbie. Interviewed by Sue MacGregor on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme, Pik Botha alleged that he and a 22-strong South African delegation, who were booked to fly from London to New York on 21 December 1988, had been targeted by the ANC. However, having been alerted to these ANC plans to kill him, Pik Botha said he managed to outsmart them by taking the earlier Pan Am Flight 101 from Heathrow to JFK, New York.

Having spent "ten thousand days" in prison in South Africa, Nelson Mandela was finally released on 11 February 1990. His first trip abroad on 21 March 1990 was to neighbouring Namibia (to join in celebrating Namibia’s independence from decades of illegal occupation by apartheid South Africa). Soon afterwards, Mandela paid a visit to Libya to thank his friend Colonel Gaddafi for supporting the ANC throughout the apartheid years. Although the two Libyans, Fhimah and Megrahi, were not indicted until November 1991, the subject of the Lockerbie bombing would almost certainly have been discussed with Gaddafi by Mandela on this visit because of Pik Botha’s bizarre accusation against the ANC.

After his release, Nelson Mandela plunged himself wholeheartedly into his life's work, striving to attain the goals he and others had set out almost four decades earlier. In 1991, at the first national conference of the ANC held inside South Africa after the organization had been banned in 1960, Mandela was elected President of the ANC while his lifelong friend and colleague, Oliver Tambo, became the organisation's National Chairperson.

Statement on Lockerbie

On 21 January 1992, nearly two years after his release from prison, Nelson Mandela issued the following statement on the Lockerbie disaster:

"The ANC has consistently condemned all acts of terrorism. The Lockerbie disaster was a tragic incident which resulted in the unfortunate loss of innocent lives. The ANC once again takes the opportunity to express deepfelt sympathy to the families of the deceased. It is in the interest of peace, stability and security that if there is clear evidence of the involvement of identified suspects they should be arrested and punished as soon as possible. In the present climate of suspicion and fear it is important that the trial should not be intended to humiliate a head of state. It should not only be fair and just, but must be seen to be fair and just. This must be in the context of respect for the sovereignty of all countries.

"The ANC believes that if the above objectives are to be achieved, the following options should be considered:

• If no extradition treaty exists between the countries concerned, the trial must be conducted in the country where the accused were arrested;
• The trial should be conducted in a neutral country by independent judges;
• The trial should be conducted at The Hague by an international court of justice.

"We urge the countries concerned to show statesmanship and leadership. This will ensure that the decade of the Nineties will be free of confrontation and conflict."

Mandela the mediator

Early in 1992, Mandela made an informal approach to President George H W Bush with a proposal to have the two accused Libyans tried in a neutral country and by independent judges. Although President Bush reacted favourably to the proposal – as did President François Mitterrand of France and King Juan Carlos I of Spain – British Prime Minister John Major flatly rejected Mandela’s plan for the Lockerbie trial.

Enter Prof Black

Robert Black, Emeritus Professor of Scots Law at Edinburgh University, intervened in the negotiations to bring the two accused to trial following the blueprint set out by Nelson Mandela. Black explained:

"I first became involved in the Lockerbie affair in January 1993. I was approached by representatives of a group of British businessmen whose desire to participate in major engineering works in Libya was being impeded by the UN sanctions. They had approached the then Dean of the Faculty of Advocates (the head of the Scottish Bar) and asked him if any of its members might be willing to provide advice to them - on an unpaid basis! - on Scottish criminal law and procedure in their attempts to unblock the logjam. The Dean of Faculty, Alan Johnston QC (later Court of Session judge Lord Johnston), recommended me. The businessmen asked if I would be prepared to provide independent advice to the government of Libya - again on an unpaid basis - on matters of Scottish criminal law, procedure and evidence with a view (it was hoped) to persuading them that their two citizens would obtain a fair trial if they were to surrender themselves to the Scottish authorities. There was, of course, never the slightest chance that surrender for trial in the United States could be contemplated by the Libyans, amongst other reasons because of the existence there of the death penalty for murder."

Since Lord Johnston died on 14 June 2008, we only have Prof Black’s word that it was Lord Johnston who recommended him to the 'group of British businessmen' whom Black resolutely refuses to identify.

Enter Tiny Rowland

In fact, the mystery group was none other than Lonrho PLC, whose chief executive Tiny Rowland (allegedly an MI6 agent) head-hunted that other asset of British intelligence, Professor Robert Black. Lonrho's Sir John Leahy – former ambassador to South Africa – supported Prof Black in his primary task which was to cover-up the targeting by apartheid South Africa’s regime of Lockerbie’s highest profile victim: United Nations Commissioner for Namibia, Bernt Carlsson. Tiny Rowland went on to finance the 1994 documentary The Maltese Double Cross in which he made the amazing claim that a 23-strong South African delegation - including foreign minister Pik Botha - were booked on Pan Am Flight 103 of 21 December 1988 but had been given a "warning from a source which could not be ignored" and changed flights. Rowland's claim was later proved to be false: Pik Botha and his delegation had always been booked on the earlier Pan Am Flight 101 to New York for their attendance at the signing ceremony of Namibia's independence agreement at United Nations headquarters in New York on 22 December 1988.

Back to Black

Professor Black’s other important task was to frustrate Nelson Mandela’s plans in relation to bringing to trial the two Libyans who had been indicted in November 1991 and were accused of carrying out the Lockerbie bombing. Thus, in October 1993, seven months before Nelson Mandela’s government took over from the apartheid South African regime, Prof Black attended a meeting in Tripoli of an international team of lawyers representing the two accused Libyans, Fhimah and Megrahi. This team consisted of lawyers from Scotland, England, Malta, Switzerland and the United States and was chaired by the principal Libyan lawyer for the accused, Dr Ibrahim Legwell. A press release issued at the conclusion of the meeting indicated that the accused were not prepared to surrender themselves for trial in either Scotland or the United States. It subsequently transpired that the primary reason for this was their belief that, because of unprecedented pre-trial publicity over the years, neither a Scottish nor an American jury could possibly bring to their consideration of the evidence the degree of impartiality and open-mindedness that accused persons are entitled to expect and that a fair trial demands. The attitude of the Libyan Government was that it was satisfied (in part due to the information and advice supplied to it by Prof Black regarding the Scottish law of criminal evidence and procedure) that its citizens would obtain a fair trial in Scotland, but that it had no constitutional authority to hand them over to the Scottish authorities. The question of voluntary surrender for trial was one for the accused and their legal advisers, and while the Libyan Government would place no obstacles in the path of, and indeed would welcome, such a course of action, there was nothing that it could lawfully do to achieve it.

Back to Tripoli

On 10 January 1994, four months before Nelson Mandela was inaugurated as President of South Africa, Prof Black visited Tripoli for a second time and, in a letter to Dr Legwell, suggested a means of resolving the impasse created by the insistence of the Governments of the United Kingdom and United States that the accused be surrendered for trial in Scotland or America and the adamant refusal of the accused to submit themselves to trial by jury in either of these countries. The proposal embodied the following five elements:

• That a trial be held outwith Scotland (perhaps in the premises of the International Court of Justice at The Hague) in which the governing law and procedure would be the law and procedure followed in Scottish criminal courts in trials on indictment.
• That the prosecution in the trial be conducted by the Scottish public prosecutor, the Lord Advocate, or his authorised representative.
• That the defence of the accused be conducted by independent Scottish solicitors and counsel appointed by the accused.
• That the jury of fifteen persons which is a feature of Scottish criminal procedure on indictment be replaced by an international panel of five judges presided over and chaired by a judge of the Scottish High Court of Justiciary whose responsibility it would be to direct the panel on Scottish law and procedure.²
• That any appeals against conviction or sentence be heard and determined in Scotland by the High Court of Justiciary in its capacity as the Scottish Court of Criminal Appeal.

Although not expressly stated in the proposal, it was the clear implication of its provisions that, in the event of the accused being convicted by the Court, they would serve any sentence of imprisonment imposed upon them in a prison in Scotland. In a letter to Prof Black dated 12 January 1994, Dr Legwell stated that this scheme was wholly acceptable to his clients, and if it were implemented by the Government of the United Kingdom the suspects would voluntarily surrender themselves for trial before a tribunal so constituted. By a letter of the same date the Deputy Foreign Minister of Libya stated that his Government would place no obstacle in the path of its two citizens should they elect to submit to trial under this scheme.

Mandela's formal offer

In November 1994 – six months after becoming President – Nelson Mandela formally offered South Africa as a neutral venue for the Lockerbie trial but this was again rejected by the then British Prime Minister, John Major, who said that the British government did not have confidence in foreign courts. Prof Black’s views on Mandela's proposal for South Africa to host the Lockerbie trial are not known but, presumably, he was strongly opposed since the apartheid regime’s role in the Pan Am bombing would undoubtedly have come to light as a result of a South African trial. A further three years elapsed until Mandela's offer was repeated to Major's successor, Tony Blair, when President Mandela visited London in July 1997 and again at the 1997 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Edinburgh between 24 and 27 October 1997. At the latter meeting, Mandela warned that "no one nation should be complainant, prosecutor and judge" in the Lockerbie case. Immediately before attending CHOGM, Mandela paid his first visit as President to Colonel Gaddafi in Libya, and visited Gaddafi again on 29 October 1997 which prompted speculation that Mandela was trying to mediate an end to the UN sanctions imposed on Libya over Lockerbie.

Influence in parliament

On 7 November 1997, Labour MP Tam Dalyell began a House of Commons debate by revealing the influence of both British tycoon Tiny Rowland and Prof Black in the context of arranging a venue for the Lockerbie trial:

"For the past 30 years, Nelson Mandela has been something of an icon for the left. His prestige for what he has done is absolutely unquestioned; therefore, surely, it behoves us to listen to what he says on what might be an awkward subject. The connection goes back to the time when Nelson Mandela wrote what I think was his only letter to the right hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr Major) as Prime Minister, which was about Lockerbie. I do not hide from anyone the fact that I was given a copy by Tiny Rowland. When there was a change of Government, the first meeting Mr Mandela had with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister lasted an hour and, at Mr Mandela's insistence, 40 minutes of it was taken up with Lockerbie. Mr Mandela then came to the Commonwealth Heads of Government conference in Edinburgh and made a much publicised statement saying that in his considered judgment no country should be claimant, prosecutor and judge in the same case and in a situation such as Lockerbie. That was his view and I do not think that I distort it. It was his opinion – tactfully expressed – that we should take seriously the idea of a trial in a third, neutral country. Indeed, that has been the view of South Africa, to whose personnel I have spoken, and of many other countries for a long time. The purpose of this debate is to go through – I hope without distortion – the objections to such a course of action and then to try to refute them. I believe in being totally candid with the House of Commons: I am not a lawyer, so I have taken advice. That advice comes predominantly from Professor Robert Black QC, professor of Scots Law in the University of Edinburgh. One of the tasks to which the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Central (Mr Lloyd), must address himself is to say why the Government lawyers believe that their opinion is superior to that of the Queen's Counsel who is professor of Scots Law in the University of Edinburgh."

Press release

On 23 April 1998, this message was sent to Safia Aoude by Prof Black, who had participated in the journey to Libya and Egypt together with Dr Jim Swire. (Robert Black is currently teaching a semester at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, and he can be reached by e-mail Gfl1@AKAD.SUN.AC.ZA or by phone on 083 731 8859.)

Lockerbie

A meeting to discuss issues arising out of the Lockerbie bombing was held in the premises of the Libyan Foreign Office in Tripoli on the evening of Saturday 18 April 1998. Present were Mr Abdul Ati Obeidi, Under-Secretary of the Libyan Foreign Office; Mr Mohammed Belqassem Zuwiy, Secretary of Justice of Libya; Mr Abuzaid Omar Dorda, Permanent Representative of Libya to the United Nations; Dr Ibrahim Legwell, head of the defence team representing the two Libyan citizens suspected of the bombing; Dr Jim Swire, spokesman for the British relatives group UK Families-Flight 103; and Professor Robert Black QC, Professor of Scots Law in the University of Edinburgh and currently a visiting professor in the Faculty of Law of the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa.

At the meeting, discussion focused upon the plan which had been formulated in January 1994 by Professor Black for the establishment of a court to try the suspects which would: operate under the criminal law and procedure of Scotland; have in place of a jury an international panel of judges presided over by a senior Scottish judge; and, sit not in Scotland but in a neutral country such as The Netherlands.

Among the issues discussed were possible methods of appointment of the international panel of judges, and possible arrangements for the transfer of the suspects from Libya for trial and for ensuring their safety and security pending and during the trial.

Dr Legwell confirmed, as he had previously done in January 1994, that his clients agreed to stand trial before such a court if it were established. The representatives of the Libyan Government stated, as they had done in 1994 and on numerous occasions since then, that they would welcome the setting up of such a court and that if it were instituted they would permit their two citizens to stand trial before it and would co-operate in facilitating arrangements for that purpose.

Dr Swire and Prof Black undertook to persist in their efforts to persuade the Government of the United Kingdom to join Libya in accepting this proposal.

On Sunday 19 April 1998, Prof Black met the South African ambassador to Libya and Tunisia, His Excellency Ebrahim M Saley, and discussed with him current developments regarding the Lockerbie bombing. He also took the opportunity to inform the ambassador of how much President Mandela's comments on the Lockerbie affair at the time of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in October 1997 in Edinburgh had been appreciated.

On Monday 20 April 1998, Dr Swire and Professor Black had a meeting lasting some 40 minutes with the Leader of the Revolution, Muammar al-Gaddafi. Also present were the Libyan Foreign Secretary, Mr Omar Ali Montasser, and Mr Dorda. The Leader was informed of the substance of the discussions held on Saturday 18 April 1998, and expressed his full support for the conclusions reached.

Prof Black has now returned to South Africa and can be contacted at the e-mail address appearing above, or by telephone on 083 731 8859 [End of message].

Personal life

Nelson Mandela has been married three times, has fathered six children, has twenty grandchildren, and a growing number of great-grandchildren. He is grandfather to Chief Mandla Mandela.

First marriage

Mandela's first marriage was to Evelyn Ntoko Mase who, like Mandela, was also from what later became the Transkei area of South Africa, although they actually met in Johannesburg. The couple broke up in 1957 after 13 years, divorcing under the multiple strains of his constant absences, devotion to revolutionary agitation, and the fact she was a Jehovah's Witness, a religion which requires political neutrality. Mase died in 2004. The couple had two sons, Madiba Thembekile (Thembi) (1946–1969) and Makgatho Mandela (1950–2005), and two daughters, both named Makaziwe Mandela (known as Maki; born 1947 and 1953). Their first daughter died aged nine months, and they named their second daughter in her honour. All their children were educated at the United World College of Waterford Kamhlaba. Thembi was killed in a car crash in 1969 at the age of 23, while Mandela was imprisoned on Robben Island, and Mandela was not allowed to attend the funeral. Makgatho died of AIDS in 2005, aged 54.

Second marriage

Mandela's second wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, also came from the Transkei area, although they, too, met in Johannesburg, where she was the city's first black social worker. They had two daughters, Zenani (Zeni), born 4 February 1958, and Zindziswa (Zindzi) Mandela-Hlongwane, born 1960. Zindzi was only 18 months old when her father was sent to Robben island. Later, Winnie would be deeply torn by family discord which mirrored the country's political strife; while her husband was serving a life sentence in the Robben Island prison, her father became the agriculture minister in the Transkei. The marriage ended in separation (April 1992) and divorce (March 1996), fueled by political estrangement.

Mandela was still in prison when his daughter Zenani was married to Prince Thumbumuzi Dlamini in 1973, elder brother of King Mswati III of Swaziland. Although she had vivid memories of her father, from the age of four up until sixteen, South African authorities did not permit her to visit him. In July 2012, Zenani was appointed ambassador to Argentina, becoming the first of Mandela's three remaining children to enter public life.

Third marriage

Mandela remarried on his 80th birthday in 1998, to Graça Machel née Simbine, widow of Samora Machel, the former Mozambican president and ANC ally who was killed in an air crash 12 years earlier.