Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela, President of South Africa

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.¹

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 saying his government did not have confidence in foreign courts.

Guardian letter

On 22 April 1992, The Guardian published this letter:

ANC as the fall-guys for Lockerbie bombing

"That double standards were evident in the Rambo-style imposition of sanctions against Libya for its refusal to ‘hand over’ the Lockerbie suspects – compared with an apparently limp response to the refusal three and a half years ago by Belgium and Ireland to ‘extradite’ a suspected terrorist to stand trial in Britain – cannot reasonably be denied (Letters, April 18). The subversion of the UN Security Council as a pawn in the West’s game of geopolitics and the denial of a fair trial to the suspects (having already been convicted by a supine media) still amount to less than half of the emerging political thriller story of Lockerbie.

"Readers of the letters page since December 1988 will know my view on where ultimate culpability for the crime of Lockerbie resides: South African state-sponsored terrorism targeted upon Pan Am 103’s most prominent victim, Bernt Carlsson, UN Commissioner for Namibia. Based purely on a hunch and some circumstantial evidence, it is a view that few others share.

"In the past week, however, David Beresford’s excellent reporting on the Winnie Mandela scandal in South Africa has prompted a dreadful thought and reminded me of what foreign minister, Pik Botha, said on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme after the December 21, 1988 disaster. Like Mr Carlsson, Mr Botha was flying to New York for the signing ceremony at the UN of the Namibia Independence Agreement. Mr Botha [reportedly] cancelled his booking on Pan Am Flight 103 and took the earlier Pan Am 101. He told Radio 4 that he thought he himself had been the target and that the ANC were the perpetrators of Lockerbie.

"According to David Beresford, the Winnie scandal began to unfold in the week after Lockerbie, on December 29, 1988. A key and mysterious player in the scandal was Mrs Xoliswa Falati, Winnie’s co-accused in the Stompie Moeketsi Seipei murder trial, whose legal costs were reportedly being met by the Libyan government. If my theory that Winnie Mandela has been and continues to be framed is correct and the ANC are being groomed as the real Lockerbie culprits, the Western media are about to tell us that Libya trained ANC guerrillas and figured on one of Nelson Mandela’s first overseas itineraries after his release from a 27-year incarceration. The inexorable conclusion is that the Libyans will be shown to have acted as the ANC’s agents by attempting to assassinate Mr Botha and blowing up Pan Am 103 instead.

"Now that the cat is prematurely out of this particular bag, the politicians concerned should consider their positions. Who will take the rap: Bush or De Klerk, Major or Mitterrand?"

Patrick Haseldine (Address supplied)