Conversations with Myself (11 page)

1. Statement from the dock

2. I meant everything I said

3. The blood of many patriots in this country have [has] been shed for demanding treatment in conformity with civilised standards

4. That army is beginning to grow

5. If I must die, let me to declare for all to know that I will meet my fate like a man

13. FROM A CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ON THE PROSPECT OF THE DEATH SENTENCE

We discussed it, as I say, and we said that it was necessary for us to think, not only just in terms of ourselves, who were in this situation, but of the struggle as a whole. We should disappear under a cloud of glory, we should fight back. This is the service we can render to our organisation and to our people. And of course, when you are alone in your cell you also thought in terms of yourself and the fact that you are likely not to live and that is…only but human. But,
collectively
, we took this decision and it also made us happy, you know, that this was the
last
service we can give to your people and your organisation.

14. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT THE DAY OF SENTENCING IN THE RIVONIA TRIAL

KATHRADA: ‘I was disturbed to discover that first day that Winnie [Mandela] was unable to attend. Because of her banning and her restrictions to Johannesburg, she needed police permission to come to court. She applied and was refused. Around the same time, I also learned that our house had recently been raided and the police detained a young relative of Winnie’s who had been staying there. Winnie was not the only wife to be harassed. Albertina Sisulu, Caroline [Motsoaledi],’ etc.
¹²
Now they wanted to know, the publishers, on page 93 [of
Long Walk to Freedom
draft]: ‘Were you concerned for the safety of your children?’

MANDELA: Yes, of course, naturally. Why should they even ask that question?

15. FROM A LETTER TO SEFTON VUTELA, DATED 28 JULY 1969
¹³

As disciplined and dedicated comrades fighting for a worthy cause, we should be ready to undertake any tasks which history might assign to us however high the price to be paid may be. This was the guiding principle throughout our political careers, and even as we went through the various stages of the trial. I must, however, confess that for my own part the threat of death evoked no desire in me to play the role of martyr. I was ready to do so if I had to. But the anxiety to live always lingered. But familiarity does breed contempt even for the hideous hand of death. The critical phase lasted a few hours only, and I was a worried and exhausted man as I went to bed the day I heard of the Rivonia swoop. But when I got up in the morning the worst was over and I had somehow mustered enough strength and courage even to rationalize that if there was nothing else I could do to further the cause we all so passionately cherished, even the dreadful outcome that threatened us might serve a useful purpose on wider issues. This belief served to feed and replenish my slender resources of fortitude until the last day of the proceedings. It was reinforced by the conviction that our cause was just and by the wide support we received from influential bodies and individuals on both sides of the Colour line. But all the flourish of trumpets and the hosannas sung by us and our well-wishers in the course of the trial would have been valueless if courage had deserted us when the decisive moment struck.

16. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT THEIR THOUGHTS BEFORE SENTENCING AT THE RIVONIA TRIAL

MANDELA: Well, it’s easy, of course,
now
to say I didn’t care, but
we
did expect a death sentence, and in fact in the morning before the judge delivered his judgement, the
sentence
, because he had already found us guilty, but before he delivered the sentence, you remember he…seemed…to have been
nervous
, and we said, ‘Well, it’s very clear, he’s going to pass the death sentence.’…

KATHRADA: Aha.

MANDELA: We
were
expecting a death sentence and we had resigned ourselves to it. But of course, it’s a very
serious
experience where you feel that somebody is going to turn to you and tell you now, that ‘This is the end of your life’ and
that
was a matter of concern, but nevertheless we had tried, you know, to steel ourselves for this eventuality, tragic as it was.

KATHRADA: Aha.

MANDELA: And I was with brave colleagues; they appeared to be braver than myself. I would like to put that on record.

KATHRADA: Aha. Well, I think that ends this chapter, at least.

MANDELA: Good.

Viewed from the vantage point of the present, the whole of Nelson Mandela’s life seems to have carried the energy of legend and the weight of epic narrative. His story was woven into the story of South Africa’s journey from colonialism, through apartheid, to democracy. That long walk to freedom of a nation was unimaginable without Mandela’s personal long walk. But it was during the more than twenty-seven years of his incarceration that his life assumed its epic proportions. Mandela became an international symbol of the struggles for justice. He was without doubt the most famous prisoner in the world. A prisoner ready by 1990, on his release, to stride across a global stage.

Conditions on Robben Island were, for the first years, very harsh. The food was poor, the work was hard, the summers hot, the winters very cold and the warders brutal. Initially only one short letter and one short visit were allowed every six months. Physical suffering was significant; psychological pain was worse. The petty-mindedness of the authorities was unrelenting. The glass partition in the visitors’ room was an obscenity. Surveillance was invasive. Every letter to a loved one about deeply personal things was written with the knowledge that a third person, the censor, was also reading it.

Over the years Mandela accommodated himself to circumstances, as the prison authorities (under pressure from the political prisoners, who fought the prison system relentlessly on issues of principle) made their own accommodations. Mandela’s privileges, and his capacity to secure leverage with the authorities, grew after his move to Pollsmoor Prison in 1982, especially after he inaugurated talks about talks with the apartheid regime in 1985. By the time he was moved to Victor Verster Prison in December 1988, where he occupied a spacious bungalow house of his own, he could see or communicate with whomever he liked. Frequently he was taken on trips out of prison, sometimes for high-level meetings, sometimes simply to see the sights. He was already a president-in-waiting.

1. FROM A LETTER TO ARCHIE GUMEDE, DATED 8 JULY 1985
¹

In conclusion, I would like to draw your attention to a letter in a JHB [Johannesburg] daily which dealt with the case of 9 men who were condemned to death by Queen Victoria for treason. As a result of protests from all over the world the men were banished. Many years thereafter, the Queen learned that one of these men had been elected PM [prime minister] of Australia, the second was appointed Brigadier-General in the USA Army, the third became Attorney-General for Australia, the fourth succeeded the third as A.G [attorney general], the fifth became Minister of Agriculture for Canada, the sixth also became Brigadier-General in the USA, the seventh was appointed Governor-General of Montana, the eighth became a prominent New York politician, and the last was appointed Governor-General of Newfoundland.

2. FROM A LETTER TO AMINA CACHALIA, DATED 8 APRIL 1969, ABOUT THE DAY THE TREASON TRIAL ENDED
²

Zami and I met you at the party the same night but you were soon gone. A few days thereafter I bade farewell to Zami and kids and now I’m a citizen across the waves.

It was not an easy decision to make. I knew the hardship, misery and humiliation to which my absence would expose them. I have spent anxious moments thinking of them and have never once doubted Zami’s courage and determination. But there are times when I even fear receiving letters from her, because on every occasion she comes down I see with my own eyes the heavy toll on her health caused by the turbulent events of the last 8 yrs.

3 FROM HIS UNPUBLISHED AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MANUSCRIPT WRITTEN IN PRISON, ABOUT THE FIRST TIME HE WAS SENT TO ROBBEN ISLAND
³

One night towards the end of May 1963 I was ordered to pack my personal belongings. At the reception office I found three other political prisoners…I learnt from Col. Aucamp who was then officer commanding, Pretoria Local, that we were being transferred to Robben Island. I hate being moved from one prison to another. It involves much inconvenience and degrading treatment. One is handcuffed and sometimes even manacled, and often it involves being exposed to prison officials and members of the public at each stop at different prisons en route while one is dressed in the humiliating prison outfit. But I was excited at the prospect of seeing Robben Island, a place that I had heard of since the days of my childhood, a place that our people talked of as esiqithini (at the Island). The Island became famous among the Xhosa people after Makana also known as Nxele, the commander of the Xhosa army in the so called Fourth Xhosa War was banished and was subsequently drowned when he tried to escape from the Island by swimming to the mainland.
⁴
His death was a sad blow to the hopes of the Xhosas and the memory of that blow has been woven into the idioms of the people who speak of a ‘forlorn hope’ by the phrase ‘Ukuza kuka Nxele’. Makana was not the first black hero to be banished and confined to Robben Island. That honour goes to Autshumayo, known to white historians as Harry the Strandloper. Autshumayo was banished by [Jan] Van Riebeeck to Robben Island at the end of the 1658 War between the Khoi Khoi and the Dutch. The honour is even more fitting in that Autshumayo was also the first and so far the only person to successfully escape from the Island. After several attempts he finally succeeded in making his break in an old boat that was ridden with holes and considered completely unseaworthy. At different times many other patriots and freedom fighters found themselves held prisoner on Robben Island. Heroes like [Chief] Maqoma, who was commander in the so called Fifth Xhosa War of 1834,
⁵
Langalibalele, the Hlubi Chief who was sentenced for High Treason by a special court in Natal in 1873, Sheikh Abdul Rahman Mantura, a political exile from Java, are part of the history of the Island.
⁶
Just as the Portuguese colonialists gave a unique place in history to the Island of Fernando Po by imprisoning their numerous African patriots, the British held Indian patriots on the Andaman Islands, and in the same way as the French held Ben Bella on [Aix] Island,
⁷
so too have the rulers of South Africa determined that Robben Island should live in the memory of our people. Robben Island – one-time leper colony, Second World War naval fortress guarding the entrance to Cape Town harbour – a tiny outcrop of limestone, bleak, windswept and caught in the wash of the cold Benguela current, whose history counts the years of our people’s bondage. My new home.

4. FROM HIS UNPUBLISHED AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MANUSCRIPT WRITTEN IN PRISON, ABOUT BEING SENT BACK TO PRETORIA

I have never been able to ascertain why after just 2 weeks on Robben Island I was transferred back to Pretoria. But I do know that the Department of Prisons released a press statement claiming that I had been removed for my own safety because PAC [Pan Africanist Congress] prisoners on the Island intended to assault me. This was a blatant falsehood because the only group of PAC prisoners with whom I had contact on the Island were my nephew and his friends with whom I was on the best terms. And subsequent meetings with various members of the PAC convinced me that the authorities fabricated this story – perhaps to cover their own reasons, perhaps as part of a deliberate design to foment and fan animosities between members of the PAC and ANC [African National Congress] both inside and outside prison. The transfer certainly had no connection with the fact that I was subsequently charged in the Rivonia Trial because the arrest which eventually led to that case took place on the 11th July 1963, almost a month after I was removed from the Island.

5. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT PRISON WARDERS

KATHRADA: Ah, then you are saying, ‘The warders were, without exception, white and Afrikaans-speaking.’ That’s not quite accurate.

MANDELA: Yes.

KATHRADA: Because there was Southerby there.

MANDELA: Aha.

KATHRADA: There was Mann there, there were some English-speaking.

MANDELA: Yes, mostly.

KATHRADA: Mostly Afrikaners, ja. And though this thing about ‘baas’.
⁸

MANDELA: [
laughs
] You could remember that Southerby?

KATHRADA: Ja.

MANDELA: Big stomach hey?

KATHRADA: Ja, Southerby.

MANDELA: What did he say?

KATHRADA: When [Andrew] Mlangeni, Mlangeni hit him on the stomach, he said…
⁹

MANDELA: [
laughs
]

KATHRADA:…Captain, where do you get this big stomach from?

MANDELA: Gee whiz!

KATHRADA: Don’t you remember? Ja, Mlangeni.

MANDELA: Yes, I think I remember that.

KATHRADA: [
laughs
] Ja.

MANDELA: But he said something to me, man, you know? And he was quite
good
, you know, in his repartee. I can’t remember now, but he thought that I had exaggerated the importance of myself, you know? But it was very witty, you know, and very
sharp.

KATHRADA: Ja. No, no, something is registering.

MANDELA: I can’t remember, I can’t remember.

KATHRADA: I can’t remember also. Ah, ‘Though we were ordered to say “baas”, we never did.’

MANDELA: Yes.

6. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT NEEDING SUNGLASSES ON ROBBEN ISLAND

KATHRADA:
Then
, when you talk about sunglasses, ah, at the quarry, even when they granted us [permission], we had to
buy
the sunglasses.
¹⁰

MANDELA: Yes.

KATHRADA: They didn’t provide them for us.

MANDELA: Yes, yes. Well they
did
provide
cheap
ones, you remember, which were…

KATHRADA: Which were useless.

7. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT WORKING AT THE QUARRY

KATHRADA: Then you are talking of lunch-time in the quarry where you are saying we sat on the ground. We didn’t really. What we did is, remember there were bricks and then we put wood, pieces of wood there.

MANDELA: Oh, I see.

KATHRADA: To sit on.

MANDELA: That’s right, that’s right.

KATHRADA: So we didn’t sit on the ground.

MANDELA: Yes, yes, yes.

KATHRADA: Then page 49 [of
Long Walk to Freedom
draft], is it true that the present trouble you are having with your eyes also had some to do with the…lime?

MANDELA: Ah. No, that’s what this specialist said…

KATHRADA: Ah.

MANDELA: Amoils is…a top specialist who actually attended to the eyes of Mrs [Margaret] Thatcher.

KATHRADA: Ah.

MANDELA: And he was given an award by Harvard University. No, he examined me very carefully; he says that there are perforations in my eyes arising out of the quarry, the lime quarry. He also treats Steve [Tshwete].
¹¹
He says he has exactly the same condition as mine.

KATHRADA: Is that so?

MANDELA: Yes. He says it’s a situation that is caused, you see, by…looking at bright sand and so on.

KATHRADA: Oh…we must add that.

MANDELA: Yes, quite.

KATHRADA: It’s an important thing.

MANDELA: Ja, it’s what he said.

KATHRADA: Because we tried to make an issue of it.

MANDELA: Yes.

KATHRADA: And those doctors just dismissed it.

MANDELA: Yes, quite…

8. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT COMMON LAW CRIMINALS ON ROBBEN ISLAND

KATHRADA: When you talk of criminals being brought to Robben Island, they were also brought there to
teach
us how to work.

MANDELA: We should also not refer to them as criminals.

KATHRADA: Ja, I know. We are saying ‘non’, I mean ‘common-law’.

MANDELA: Common-law prisoners…

KATHRADA: Common-law prisoners were brought to the quarry also to teach us. If you remember, this fat one.

MANDELA: I see.
Oh
yes!

KATHRADA: And that other guy, Tigha who used to also give us haircuts now and then.

MANDELA: Oh I see, I see.

KATHRADA: They were really brought, some of them, to spy on us.

MANDELA: [
laughs
] Clearly.

KATHRADA: And also to
teach
us how to work.

MANDELA: Yes, that’s right.

KATHRADA: Ah. They tried to demonstrate with pick and shovel so that we could work harder.

9. CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA ABOUT THE BANK ROBBER

KATHRADA: Page 51 [of
Long Walk to Freedom
draft]: ‘There was, for example, a bank robber among us whose name was Joe My Baby.’

MANDELA: Ah, I see, his surname is Sihlabane…You see, I don’t know what his boxing name was. Even if he was a bank robber, man, I don’t think we should say that.

KATHRADA: Ah.

MANDELA: Because he’s doing a responsible job.

KATHRADA: Ja.

MANDELA: He was one of our best chaps.

KATHRADA: He’s very good, ja.

MANDELA:
Very
good…

KATHRADA: It was Poppies and him, remember?

MANDELA: Huh? Yes, that’s right.

KATHRADA: Poppies and him.

MANDELA: Yes, yes.

KATHRADA: They had decided among the two of them that one of them would be in charge of the political prisoners, smuggling things to us and Poppies would be looking after the common-law prisoners who came to do three meals or something.
¹²

MANDELA: Oh, I see.

KATHRADA: And they used to smuggle food.

MANDELA: Yes, yes, yes.

KATHRADA: To the people who were punished.

MANDELA: Mmm.

KATHRADA: But both of them are very good.

MANDELA: Very good men.

KATHRADA: Poppies was, was really the expert in car, car theft.

MANDELA: I believe so, yes.

KATHRADA: Then, of course, he used to sell back-door goods to the Indians. [
both laugh
] He used to name them to me, who the Indians were, and I knew them all.

MANDELA:
Yes?

KATHRADA: Poppies used to supply them with stuff.

MANDELA:
Hey
, that was an excellent chap, man. It’s a pity that he died.

KATHRADA: He
died
?

MANDELA: Yes, he was shot.

KATHRADA: Poppies?

MANDELA: Yes.

KATHRADA: Oh.

MANDELA: Yes, shortly after he had come out, they shot him.

KATHRADA: Oh, I see.

MANDELA: In Meadowlands.

KATHRADA: Ay, he was a very intelligent chap.

MANDELA: Very intelligent.

KATHRADA: Articulate fellow.

MANDELA: Mmm.

10. CONVERSATION WITH RICHARD STENGEL ABOUT SINGING IN PRISON

STENGEL: Singing was banned?

MANDELA: Yes, yes, yes, at first that is. Singing anywhere in prison especially when you are working…They took us to the quarry to dig lime. Now that is a very difficult operation because you use a pick. The lime is in layers of rock. You find a rock layer…and to get to the lime you have to
break
that layer…They
sent
us there, because they wanted to show us that to come to jail is not an easy thing, it’s not a
picnic
and you must never come to jail again. They wanted to
break
our spirits. So what we did was to sing freedom songs as we were working and
everybody
was inspired, you know; went through the work…with
high
morale, and then of course dancing to the music as we were working, you know? Then the authorities realized that…These chaps, you see, are too militant. They’re in high spirits and they say, ‘No singing as you are working.’ So you
really
felt the
toughness
of the work…And of course, they had a regulation in the disciplinary code which banned singing, [and] they enforced it…Although we listened to them…when we went back to our cells, especially on the eve of Christmas and New Year, we organised singing concerts and we sang. So they eventually got used to that.