The future of South Africa: 30 years of democracy and beyond

President Cyril Ramaphosa paid tribute to the resolute lion of the courtroom George Bizos on hearing of his passing.



Bizos died among his family at the house he built in 1959 Parktown North, in Johannesburg. It was a small home with a famous vegetable garden built by the man himself. In latter years many of Bizos&#8217;s friends told him he should move to a bigger house, but he would have none of it. Bizos was one of that generation of selfless fighters for freedom in South Africa who cared nothing for the trappings of wealth and power. 



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/gettyimages-1152457961-594x594-1.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-374813" width="690" height="549" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/gettyimages-1152457961-594x594-1.jpg 594w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/gettyimages-1152457961-594x594-1-300x239.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 690px) 100vw, 690px" /><figcaption>OSAKA, JAPAN &#8211; JUNE 28: (RUSSIA OUT) South African President Cyril Ramaphosa speeches during a bilateral meeting at the G20 Osaka Summit 2019, June 28, 2019 in Osaka, Japan. Vladimir Putin has arrived to Japan to participate the G20 Osaka Summit and to meet U.S.President Donald Trump. (Photo by Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images)</figcaption></figure>



&#8220;Ït is sad news for us as South Africans , George Bizos is one of those lawyers who contributed immensely to the attainment of our democracy. He worked very closely with Nelson Mandela, Arthur Chaskalson and many others and as the government we extend our condolences to his family and we extend condolences to all of us South Africans because George Bizos&#8217;s name was a well know name and he had an incisive legal mind and also was one of the architects of our constitution and contributed immensely. He will surely be missed and we dip our heads in honour that the contribution that George Bizos had made to our democracy. We shall ever remember his contribution,&#8221; says President Ramaphosa on hearing the news. 



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1023" height="682" src="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-381312" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers.jpg 1023w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-820x547.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-696x464.jpg 696w" sizes="(max-width: 1023px) 100vw, 1023px" /><figcaption>Rivonia lawyers reunited Joel Jeffe George Bizos and Denis Kuny</figcaption></figure>



Bizos came to South Africa, along with his father, as a 13-year-old refugee during World War Two. The pair slipped out of their native Greece, then occupied by the Germans, on a fishing boat and made the long sea journey to South Africa. 



Decades later Bizos recalled sitting on the beach on a holiday home to Greece. He said the Greek man looked at him and his moustache and commented to his wife in his mother tongue, assuming that Bizos could not understand: &#8220;Ï want to move away from that man he reminds me of the German officer who tortured me.&#8221;



Bizos smiled at the memory but always used it as a grim reminder of the absurdity of human prejudice. This was something that he fought in the courts every step of the way from the day he joined the Johannesburg bar to almost his last breath. He represented Nelson Mandela &#8211; whom he befriended during their legal studies &#8211; at the Rivonia sabotage trial and the treason trial. More than 50 years later he represented the relatives of the victims of the Marikana massacre.

Bizos and lawyers

“We dip our heads in honour” – Ramaphosa lauds the late Bizos

The gentle lion of the courts of justice who fought for the rights of his fellow man &#8211; almost to his last breath &#8211; is gone.



Human rights lawyer George Bizos died at his Johannesburg home on the sun drenched afternoon of September 9 of natural causes, according to his family.



The last time I saw him was seven years ago at a reunion of the Rivonia Trial lawyers: Bizos; Joel Joffe and Denis Kuny at Liliesleaf, in Rivonia, where the arrest of the leaders of the underground lent the famous trial its name.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1023" height="682" src="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-381312" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers.jpg 1023w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-820x547.jpg 820w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Bizos-and-lawyers-696x464.jpg 696w" sizes="(max-width: 1023px) 100vw, 1023px" /><figcaption>Joel Joffe George Bizos and Denis Kuny Liliesleaf 2013</figcaption></figure>



 On that day the great man asked if I could help him up a flight of stairs. He lent gently on me and with a huff there and a puff here and there we made it to the top. I felt honoured. 



Bizos has spent a lifetime fighting the good fight in court and helped save the life of South Africa’s first black president at South Africa’s trial of the century in 1964. 



Mandela and his comrades faced the death penalty on charges of sabotage in the so called Rivonia Trial at the Palace of Justice in Pretoria. To make matters even more difficult for the defence team was the fact that the accused refused to deny the charges relating to a string of attacks on government property from electricity pylons to post boxes. They argued that the apartheid state should have been in the dock instead.



Bizos was one of the junior members of a heavy weight defence team led by experienced human rights advocates Braam Fischer, Joffe and Arthur Chaskelson.



Survivors of the trial remember Bizos as a bright young man who was always quick with the sandwiches and a quip, as well as sound legal counsel. He was a shining young light in the endless hours in the bowels of the Palace of Justice as the accused waited to ascend the steep, dark, staircase to the dock each day.



It was Bizos who told me, in 2013, how he altered the world famous speech from the dock by Mandela in which he spoke for his comrades. Mandela spoke of the ideal of a free and multi-racial South Africa which he hoped to live to see.



“But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die,” concluded Mandela to a stunned court.



“There was a deafening silence at the end of the speech, you could have heard a pin drop,”&nbsp; Chaskelson told me more than half a century later.



Bizos told me at Liliesleaf on a warm summer&#8217;s evening , that he had persuaded Mandela to insert “if needs be” into the speech. It took some persuasion for the legally trained pen of Mandela to make a change, but after a burst of Bizos browbeating, he agreed.



“I felt the speech was too strong as it was. It was an invitation to the judge to hang everyone and make them martyrs, so I recommended we put in the words ‘If needs be’” says Bizos.



Joffe, a former chairman of Oxfam made Lord Joffe by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, remembered Mandela’s reaction to the change.



“I read my speech and there seems to be an error, he said, it is my sentence and I want it back!” Joffe chuckled.



Bizos also claimed he was the first to learn that the Rivonia trialists were not going to hang long before the verdict in Pretoria.



The British government had been putting pressure on the South African authorities not to hang Mandela and his comrades. It feared that they would be made martyrs and fuel unrest that could threaten British investments in South Africa.



Bizos recalled a social gathering at the embassy where the British ambassador had more than a few drinks.



“As I walked out he put his arm around me and said: ‘Don’t worry George, they are not going to hang and Rusty Bernstein will be acquitted,” Bizos said.



So it was, to the letter, weeks later in court. Even though the accused were upbeat and smiling on their way to prison following the verdict holding up three fingers to Bizos through the window of the police van.



&#8220;Three years George and we will be out!&#8221; they shouted to their lawyer.



But it was not to be so, life was to mean life for the Rivonia trialists who spent nearly 30 years behind bars. 



All of the Rivonia trialists &#8211; who have now passed on &#8211; emerged from prison to see a free South Africa. How different history could have been if it were not for a dose of timely diplomatic pressure and a canny counsel by the name of Bizos.

George Bizos- the man who helped save Mandela’s neck

It says a lot about the character of Andrew Mlangeni that when he was released from prison in 1989 – for crimes he didn’t commit, by the way – he returned to his humble abode in Dube, in Soweto, near Johannesburg; the very family home where police burst into his bedroom in the middle of a cold winter’s night in 1963 to arrest him.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-1110x738.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-376816" width="569" height="377" srcset="https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-1110x738.jpg 1110w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-300x199.jpg 300w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-1536x1021.jpg 1536w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-2048x1362.jpg 2048w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-1068x710.jpg 1068w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-1920x1277.jpg 1920w, https://cms.cnbcafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/DSC_1392-1-600x399.jpg 600w" sizes="(max-width: 569px) 100vw, 569px" /></figure>



This home was as humble and wholesome as the man’s approach to life. Sure, Mlangeni enjoyed a convivial party and the golf course, but not for him sipping Chivas Regal in a polo club, nor huge flashy houses, nor the latest luxury cars; never greed, nor vast wealth, for Andrew Mlangeni. For what? He would have said. During all those murky years of the President Jacob Zuma, when did anyone ever see the name of Mlangeni come up? Never.



“He was a principled man, of note,” says former finance minister and parliamentary colleague Nhlanlha Nene.



Principle that cost Mlangeni &nbsp;more than a quarter of his life behind bars for something he didn’t do. He told me that the police merely transferred the charges of sabotage levelled at his comrade, the late former defence minister Joe Modise, to him.



“I didn’t do anything!” Mlangeni told me half a century later. He pleaded guilty with Nelson Mandela &nbsp;and his comrades in a show of solidarity intended to put the apartheid government on trial. It worked and overnight the accused transcended criminal charges to be seen as the freedom fighting Benjamin Franklins of Africa.



Mlangeni grew up in Soweto as a towering man of principle, who never backed down. When he was arrested in 1963, police tortured him brutally with electrodes and their fists. In a chance meeting in 2010, ironically in the colonial splendour of the Rand Club in downtown Johannesburg, Mlangeni &nbsp;puffed on a Consulate cigarette, with a group of friends,as he told me of this torture 50 years before. The police tortured him with electrodes and dished out arguably the worst beating inflicted on any of the Rivonia trialists. He said at one point the police were waterboarding him; that is, holding a bag over his head while they poured water through.



“I felt my lungs fill up, I was drowning, I was gone…then one of the police hit me hard in the stomach and all of the water spurted out of me and I was OK!”



All of us listening, over post lunch drinks, laughed including the late veteran photographer, Alf Kumalo, who once had his skull cracked in police cells. If you have suffered through politics or journalism, as Alf had in both, you tend to see the funny side of the ugliest of moments.



Everyone has and Andrew Mlangeni story including Sello Hatang the chief executive of the Nelson Mandela Foundation.



“He called me Murwa because I shared a first name with his son. He always made time for me, and always brought a smile to my face with his dry, self-deprecating sense of humour. When asked one day about his lifelong smoking habit, for instance, he responded: It has ruined my singing voice.’’ When asked on another occasion, late in life, if he was still playing golf, he said: ‘If not for my knee I would still be out on the tee,’” recalls Hatang.



It was fitting, in 2018, that Mlangeni was awarded the prestigious freedom of Johannesburg – the city where he was put in chains and incarcerated a lifetime ago. A precious gift of freedom to a man who knew how hard and painful it was to achieve. &nbsp;

Andrew Mlangeni

How a brutal torturer saved Andrew Mlangeni from death by drowning.

The last survivor of the courageous band of young men who faced unflinchingly the death penalty with Nelson Mandela has died aged 95.



The quiet and steely revolutionary Andrew Mlangeni was the last of the survivor of the Rivonia trial, ending in 1964, that saw Mandela and his comrades sentenced to life imprisonment for their part in the underground movement that ran a sabotage campaign as part of the armed struggle against apartheid. Denis Goldberg, the other survivor, died in Cape Town in April.



Mlangeni served 27 years in prison, his release came only in 1989, on charges that he had nothing to do with. In later years he used to smile that he had served a life sentence for principle and nothing else. Like all the Rivonia trilaists he pleaded guilty to all the charges, in the hope of putting the government in the dock; it turned out to be so with the international press writing them up not as criminals, but as the Benjamin Franklins of Africa.



The last survivor of the courageous band of young men who faced unflinchingly the death penalty with Nelson Mandela has died aged 95.



The quiet and steely revolutionary Andrew Mlangeni was the last of the survivor of the Rivonia trial, ending in 1964, that saw Mandela and his comrades sentenced to life imprisonment for their part in the underground movement that ran a sabotage campaign as part of the armed struggle against apartheid. Denis Goldberg, the other survivor, died in Cape Town in April.



Mlangeni served 27 years in prison, his release came only in 1989, on charges that he had nothing to do with. In later years he used to smile that he had served a life sentence for principle and nothing else. Like all the Rivonia trilaists he pleaded guilty to all the charges, in the hope of putting the government in the dock; it turned out to be so with the international press writing them up not as criminals, but as the Benjamin Franklins of Africa.



“All the things that were done by Modise (Joe Modise the late former defence minister) &nbsp;were put on me by the state witness. Everything; I didn’t do anything, I was out of the country. Even when they were concerning bombs etc. That was in 1961 and I was not here!” he told me in 2010 at his home in Dube, Soweto.



Mlangeni was under military training in China in 1961 where, along with Modise, he was to become one of the founder members of Umkhonto We Sizwe the military wing of the African National Congress. He even knew little of the underground’s sketchy plan –Operation Mayibuye- for the armed overthrow of South Africa. This half-baked plan imagined small armed groups of men landing on the beaches of South Africa and taking on one of Africa’s toughest defence forces. This was one of the main planks of the prosecution case at the Rivonia trial.



“We were fresh from China and eager to fight, so things such as documents we said let them go to the intellectuals,” said Mlangeni &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



Mlangeni , who grew up in Soweto just outside Johannesburg, was born to question the system that condemned thinking men, like he, into a life of poorly paid servitude. He became an activist at an early age, politicized by the injustices he saw in his first job in a factory. &nbsp;Later,he was to organize bus drivers in Johannesburg in going on strike.



On his emergence from prison, Mlangeni returned to the small house in Dube that he was arrested in during the winter of 1963. He became an ANC MP and in his mid 80s was very active and opened a constituency office in Dube to help serve the people. &nbsp;&nbsp;







Mlangeni was under military training in China in 1961 where, along with Modise, he was to become one of the founder members of Umkhonto We Sizwe the military wing of the African National Congress. He even knew little of the underground’s sketchy plan –Operation Mayibuye- for the armed overthrow of South Africa. This half-baked plan imagined small armed groups of men landing on the beaches of South Africa and taking on one of Africa’s toughest defence forces. This was one of the main planks of the prosecution case at the Rivonia trial.



“We were fresh from China and eager to fight, so things such as documents we said let them go to the intellectuals,” said Mlangeni &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



Mlangeni , who grew up in Soweto just outside Johannesburg, was born to question the system that condemned thinking men, like he, into a life of poorly paid servitude. He became an activist at an early age, politicized by the injustices he saw in his first job in a factory. &nbsp;Later,he was to organize bus drivers in Johannesburg in going on strike.



On his emergence from prison, Mlangeni returned to the small house in Dube that he was arrested in during the winter of 1963. He became an ANC MP and in his mid 80s was very active and opened a constituency office in Dube to help serve the people. &nbsp;&nbsp;

DSC_1392

End of an era: firebrand Andrew Mlangeni  the last of Nelson Mandela’s band of brothers dies aged 95.

Nelson Mandela once said that he may have been in prison for 27 years but he was not confined for one day because he could read and that lent his spirit freedom.



It appears that hunger for literacy may have condemned Mandela and his comrades to a life behind bars. On the eve of Mandela Day, July 18 which would have been his 102nd birthday, it is interesting to speculate that this joy of reading may have set in motion of chain of events that led to a life behind bars for his comrades in the underground.



One crisp winter afternoon on July 11 1963 police scooped up almost the entire leadership of the underground as they met in a small cottage the back of Liliesleaf farm, in Rivonia, Johannesburg, in a Trojan horse-style raid, with dogs and officers concealed in a pharmacy van. They arrested a ‘who’s who of the struggle: Govan Mbeki; Ray Mahlaba; Denis Goldberg; Walter Sisulu; Ahmed Kathrada; and Andrew Mlangeni.



“Ons het de jackpot!” said the triumphant arresting officer, as he telephoned the police station to inform his colleagues of the raid. In English, we have hit the jackpot. The police couldn’t believe their luck as they chained who they saw and desperadoes in a circle, on the Liliesleaf lawn,and allowed their dogs to snap at them.



“It is high treason chaps,” said Mbeki as the van was driven away. The captured laughed but they all knew the charges they were to face meant the death sentence. The armed struggle and bombings they had been running for many months had destroyed many key installations.



How the raid on Rivonia, which lent its name to the trial in which all were sentenced to life, came about has been argued over for years. Theories abound from informants, to nosey neighbours, to foreign spies.



There could be another theory connected to Mandela’s love of reading. Mbeki et al used to pretend to be farm workers at Liliesleaf, as part of their cover. They were so good at this that they used to sell the vegetables they grew to the nearby Rivonia police! So the police put food on the table through the hard work of revolutionaries, yet never twigged who grew it.



What could have given the Liliesleaf crew away was their love of reading. Being intellectual revolutionaries they all devoured daily newspapers that aroused suspicion. Surviving fellow farm workers recalled in interviews, in 2012, that they told people they worked with “black men with newspapers” – a rarity in 1960s South Africa.



Another incident, depicted in the painting by Kevin Krapf at the top of this article, involving Nelson Mandela reading a newspaper, heightened that suspicion.



 A nearby farmer  by the name of Ernest Vickers called in to see Arthur Goldreich, an activist who lived in the farm as a front for the underground. Vickers was shocked to see a black man sitting in the lounge with his feet up on the coffee table reading a newspaper. The man was lawyer Mandela who was pretending to be a domestic worker at the farm and was to become his country’s first democratically elected president.



Unbelievably, in this day and age, Vickers reported what he had seen to the Rivonia police, maybe as it was taking another delivery of vegetables.  Years later, Vickers was convinced that it was this report that led to the raid and life imprisonment. He was also worried about the repercussion there could be for his own family.



Maybe ?&nbsp; Maybe not. It could be forever lost in the mist of times that shroud the rich Mandela story. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

20200717_093810

“It is high treason chaps!”-  How the joy of reading could have put Nelson Mandela and his struggle comrades behind bars.

Zindzi Mandela &#8211; the daughter of Nelson and Winnie Mandela &#8211; died in the early hours of July 13 in a Johannesburg hospital. She was South Africa&#8217;s ambassador to Denmark and a spokesman for DIRCO said she was the second to die in the pandemic. 



Zindzi grew up with her father in prison for most of her life and was a staunch activist. In 1985 she famously told the world that her father had rejected PW Botha&#8217;s offer of freedom. 



Zindzi Mandela, daughter of Nelson Mandela, has died &#8211; ANC spokesman &#8211; Reuters



“This is untimely. She still had a role to play in the transformation of our own society and a bigger role to play even in the African National Congress,” said ANC spokesman Pule Mabe.



South Africa&#8217;s foreign minister Naledi Pandor said that Zindzi was not just the child of two hallowed struggle activists &#8211; she was a struggle heroine herself.

Picture taken for the December 2014 cover of FORBES WOMAN AFRICA by Jay Caboz1

Zindzi Mandela dies aged 59

By Chris Bishop



I once asked Denis Goldberg what he thought of one of his high ranking former comrades taking R500, 000 in bribes from a crook.



“What a cheapskate!” came back the reply faster than a gunslinger’s bullet. I expected more pious reply, not with Denis.



“He has sold out his job, his country, his beliefs, his politics and his morals – for half a million bucks?”



Denis said it with that dead pan look on his face. Believe me, he was deadly serious and angry, but his expression dissolved into that famous smile of his that made you think we frail human beings all make mistakes.



That was Denis and his attitude in a nutshell – he was principled and far from enamoured, in later years, with all that was going in the government that he fought to put in power and was never afraid to say so; and yet, he never forgot that we are all human and vulnerable, something that fuelled his tireless charity work.



I first met Denis at his home near the crashing waves of Hout Bay, near Cape Town, the city where he was born and should have lived out his days as a comfortable engineer in the suburbs. Instead he spent years training revolutionaries in the art of warfare and making bombs.



&nbsp;We got to know each other during the making of a three-hour documentary Liliesleaf – the Untold Story for CNBC Africa on the Rivonia trial, in 1963, where he faced the death penalty with Nelson Mandela. We kept in touch down the years with lunch, a phone call and the odd laugh about the absurdity of politics.



I shall never forget the warm, human, story he told on that summer day back in 2009 about how he sneaked small squares of chocolate to a chained and emaciated Mandela, in short trousers, whom police had dragged from prison to face sabotage charges.



“You don’t get sweeteners in prison,” said Goldberg with a smile.



Alongside Mandela, on that day, were the leading lights of the liberation movement: Walter Sisulu; Govan Mbeki; Ray Mhlaba; Andrew Mlangeni and Ahmed Kathrada. Only Mlangeni, who will be 95 in June, survives. &nbsp;



The authorities hoped would put them away forever. They nearly succeeded and certainly set back the liberation of South Africa by decades by incarcerating the leaders of the movement for life.



“’There was Mandela standing in the dock defiantly and forcing the judge to look him in the eye,” Goldberg said as if the hearing were yesterday at the Palace of Justice in Pretoria.



For some reason, Denis and I got on like a house on fire. He reminded me of my grandfathers – a hard man ready to fight for what was right, yet humane and compassionate with it.



The tough side of him came out in that interview. He told how the special branch officers used to taunt him across the courtroom, as the evidence was presented, by running their forefingers across their throats with a grin of death.



“I had to think about how to respond and in the end I did this back…” says Denis giving it the middle finger. Anyone who can give the finger to their captors in the shadow of death is tough enough.



Then, when he was relating the harrowing tale of his fractured relationship with his daughter, Hilary came out the old soldier hide of granite.



It was a sorrowful tale. Denis’s daughter worshipped him from afar as a latter day Robin Hood in the 20 years he was in prison. When he was released in 1984 they were reunited in Israel. A few months later the two fell out. It started when Hilary filtered the pile of hate mail from his daily post.



“I told her, Hilary, Hilly, you are trying to control me like they did in prison,” he said.&nbsp;



It all blew up. An angry Hilary told her father he had never been around and was always away fighting the struggle, you could see the pain Denis’s face.



“It took five years and a lot of counselling, but we reconciled. Unfortunately shortly after that she died.”



By this time both the young cameraman and myself, I am not ashamed to say this, had cast off our professional masks and had tears rolling down our cheeks.



“What’s the matter with you guys?” shot back Goldberg in mock outrage.



“I thought journalists were supposed to tough. I don’t know, the journalists of today!”



Then we all laughed, once again Denis had made people feel they would see the sun tomorrow.



His humour was legendary, as was his compassion. He once told me that he was handed three life sentences but was given a bulk discount and only served one. On the other side of the coin, he told me of the horror of lying in his cell listening to condemned men screaming as warders dragged them to the gallows. It was pure Denis that he learned the guitar so he could play a heartfelt musical tribute to the condemned.



Only Denis could have led the laughter in court when he and his comrades slipped the noose.



“Life and life is wonderful,” he called out when someone asked the verdict of the dock.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Amid all the laughter, sound and fury of the life of Denis Goldberg there is one cool winter’s afternoon that I will always remember him by. It was at Liliesleaf , in 2013, at the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the raid on Rivonia that led him to spending 20 years in prison.



It was a draining day for an 80-year-old. There were journalists asking questions and taking pictures everywhere. Denis was patient and explained his story to those too young and green to know, but as the day wore on I could see he was getting tired. It was a Rivonia reunion with lawyers Joel Joffe, who became an insurance tycoon in Britain, and George Bizos, still fighting the good fight, there to reminisce with the men they saved from the noose.



On top of that, Denis had to settle a 50-year-old grudge with the late Bob Hepple, a former comrade who was up to his neck in the sabotage trial. He had negotiated his way out of police cells with a decision to turn state witness that led to him skipping the country to a knighthood and a comfortable life as a professor at Cambridge University.



“At the time, I told him you do this and people will cross the street to avoid you,” Denis told me.



To rub salt in the wound, Hepple sent Denis, insensitively,&nbsp; a Christmas card in prison in his first year of incarceration. Fifty years later Denis shook hands with Hepple and buried the grudge with good humour.



My abiding memory of Denis came later on that day as the sunlight dimmed along with his fading energy.&nbsp; A young schoolgirl, in uniform, who must have been about 13, approached him as he was heading for the car to take him to the hotel.



“Excuse me Mr Goldberg I am doing my school project on the Rivonia trial can I talk to you?” she says. Even I thought an exhausted Denis he was going to decline politely, but he sat down and smiled.



More than an hour later I saw Denis sitting at the table telling patiently his story to the school girl making copious notes. Maybe she will fight for freedom one day too.



I smiled and walked away. That was Denis and I was proud to have known him.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

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Farewell one of the last survivors of Mandela’s band of brothers: Denis Goldberg – the gentle lion of the struggle.

By Chris Bishop



One of the last of the band of brothers who stood in the dock with Nelson Mandela, in the shadow of noose, has died aged 87 after a life of trying to help others.



Denis Goldberg was one of the accused in the Rivonia trail where Mandela and his comrades faced charges of sabotage that carried the death penalty. Andrew Mlangeni, who will be 95 in June, is the sole survivor of those accused who were sentenced to life in 1964.



Goldberg trained as an engineer and could have made a comfortable living for himself, but was sickened to his guts by the apartheid regime in South Africa. In the wake of the Sharpeville massacre in 1960 he joined the military wing of the African National Congress &#8211; Mhkonto Wesizwe where he trained recruits and because he was an engineer everyone assumed he could make bombs.



In the police raid on Liliesleaf farm in Rivonia, in Johannesburg, in 1963, detectives caught Goldberg reading a book at the end of a day trying to procure hand grenades for the sabotage campaign. The raid also collared the leading lights of the underground movement: Walter Sisulu; Ahmed Kathrada; Mlangeni and Govan Mbeki. It led to the famous trial in which Mandela and his comrades spent the best part of 27 years on Robben Island.



Goldberg was separated from his comrades, because he was white, and sent to a whites-only prison in Pretoria where he served 20 years in the same cell. The separation from those he had fought the struggle with hurt Goldberg deeply.



In 1984, Goldberg was released from prison and flew to Israel to be reunited with his wife Esme and daughter Hilary. He went to London to work for the ANC in exile.



In his retirement, Goldberg returned to the city of his birth &#8211; Cape Town. He built his own home among the fishing cottages of Hout Bay. He was energetic in retirement and spent the remainder of his days working for peace and the betterment of others.



Goldberg spent most of his life working for a political movement. Anyone who knew him will tell you he was his own man. When politics and the ruling party took a dismal turn in South Africa he was never afraid to speak out against the ill-advised actions of many of his former comrades.

One of the last of Mandela’s band of brothers is gone – freedom fighter Denis Goldberg  passes away.

By Chris Bishop, head of programming CNBC Africa



The results of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s rare elections are expected this weekend, according to a special adviser to one of the candidates promising a business friendly government and Mandela-style reconciliation for the war torn, yet mineral rich,nation.



It has been a journey of drudgery, downpours, allegations of fraud and protest since the polls opened on December 30 to find a successor to Joseph Kabila. He has stepped down after nearly two decades running the country that his father, Laurent, who died in a mysterious assassination in 2001, took control of in 1997 after overthrowing Mobuto Sese Seko.



Felix Tshisekedi, the son of a former minister who studied in Belgium and set up his own delivery business in Brussels after years working in the Post Office, is fighting it out with former Exxon Mobil manager and opposition lawmaker Martin Fayulu and the man with Kabila’s vote, former interior minister Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary.



 <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RDC?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RDC</a> Le Président Joseph <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Kabila?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Kabila</a> a rempli son devoir civique, en compagnie des siens, ce dimanche 30 décembre 2018 à Kinshasa. <a href="https://t.co/tMiljzmywD">pic.twitter.com/tMiljzmywD</a>— Présidence RDC ?? (@Presidence_RDC) <a href="https://twitter.com/Presidence_RDC/status/1079286376816930816?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 30, 2018</a></blockquote>
<script async="" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>



“The latest we are leading by between 40 and 45%, in 13 out of 14 provinces. Around 70% of the vote has been counted and we understand all the votes have been captured,” says Claude Ibalanky Ekolomba, the special adviser to Tshisekedi . 



“Overall we are excited and extremely confident. We are leading the race at the moment.”



<h3 class="wp-block-heading"><a href="http://cnbc.africa/news/international/2018/12/31/drc-elections-why-the-opposition-is-crying-foul/">Read: DRC elections: Opposition, ruling coalition both say they’ve won, here’s why</a></h3>



Ibalanky Ekolomba, who is visiting Johannesburg, admits it is difficult to keep contact with the people back in the DRC with the internet shut down by the state for fear it may stir unrest.



“We have ways to get through, it is not always reliable but we do and it is the people on the ground who know what is happening,” he says. He pointed to a case of alleged fraud where a bag of votes for Tshisekedi were found by a fisherman in a river near Lake Kivu who simply picked it up and reported it to the authorities.



“You cannot stop 30 million people witnessing their own election and when things are happening we are told.”



Ibalanky Ekolomba says Tshisekedi wants to be a business friendly president, if elected, in search of the foreign direct investment that the DRC desperately needs to reap the rewards of its rich minerals.&nbsp;Tshisekedi did not plan to cancel contracts with foreign companies as had been done before after changes of government.



“If we find a mistake in a contract we will engage and see how we are going to correct it,” he says.



“Some people are fearing we will be hard on business but not at all – we will be open for business.”



Tshisekedi also promises to appoint people to government on merit.



“Fighting corruption and money laundering. There will be no witch hunt among people who were members of the former government, we will be saying let’s build this country together just like Mandela did,” says Ibalanky Ekolomba.&nbsp;

DRC elections: Downpours,no internet drudgery and a fisherman’s find on the way to a Mandela- inspired tomorrow?

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One of the biggest names in world television came to Africa for what she believes is one of the biggest issues facing the continent. Isithunzi Sabafazi which means the dignity of women in tribute of one of the biggest revolutionaries, Nelson Mandela. He would have turned 100 years this year. Forbes Africa&#8217;s Karen Mwendera reports.

Oprah celebrates women and Mandela at the Isithunzi Sabafazi dialogue

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From now on there will be a seat in South Africa that will forever remind people who sit on it of the cramped struggle and years of endurance of Nelson Mandela. CNBC Africa’s Lubabalo Mashiqana reports.

iMadiba installation launched in Sandton

By Zikhona Masala, CNBC Africa reporter and producer
As the world celebrates 100 years since the birth of struggle icon, Nelson Mandela, we can’t ignore the growing list of things named after the former statesman from restaurants to streets across the globe. Here are 18 of the not so obvious.
<ol>
<li>Nelson Mandela Train Station </li>
</ol>
A train station in Tunis, the capital city of Tunisia.
<ol start="2">
<li>Singafrotypa Mandela </li>
</ol>
 An African orb-weaver spider which belongs to the spider family called Araneidae.
<ol start="3">
<li>Paravanda Nelson Mandela</li>
</ol>
An orchid in Singapore named after Nelson Mandela.
<ol start="4">
<li>Mandela Tea</li>
</ol>
 A tea brand specialising in making indigenous South African flavours.
<ol start="5">
<li>Nelson Mandela Tree</li>
</ol>
 A tree named after Mandela in Columbia.
<ol start="6">
<li>Strelitzia reginae also known as Mandela’s Gold</li>
</ol>
 A crane flower previously called the Kirstenbosch Gold which was later renamed in honour of Nelson Mandela.
<ol start="7">
<li>House of Mandela Wine</li>
</ol>
 A wine collection produced by the daughter and granddaughter of the late South African President Nelson Mandela.
<ol start="8">
<li>Australopicus nelsonmandelai </li>
</ol>
The oldest woodpecker species whose remains were unearthed at the Langebaanweg fossil site named in South Africa&#8217;s south-west coast.
<ol start="9">
<li>Mandelia Micocornata</li>
</ol>
 A sea slug named by Marine biologists.
<ol start="10">
<li>Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University </li>
</ol>
The result of the merging of the University of Port Elizabeth and PE Technikon in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa.
<ol start="11">
<li>Nelson Mandela Bridge</li>
</ol>
South Africa’s largest cable-stayed bridge which connects Johannesburg’s inner city.
<ol start="12">
<li>Nelson Mandela Square</li>
</ol>
A public shopping square situated in Sandton, Johannesburg in Africa’s richest square mile.
<ol start="13">
<li>Nelson Mandela Gateway </li>
</ol>
The gateway to Robben Island Prison in Cape Town where South African freedom fighters were imprisoned.
<ol start="14">
<li>Nelson Mandela Capture Site</li>
</ol>
The site at which Nelson Mandela was apprehended for his anti-Apartheid activism in August 1952.
<ol start="15">
<li>MandelaDay Marathon</li>
</ol>
 Mandela Day Marathon venue is just next to the site where Madiba was captured.
<ol start="16">
<li>Madiba Shirts</li>
</ol>
The shirts became Madiba’s trademark clothing item. FUN FACT: Sonwabile Ndamase who was Nelson Mandela’s designer the shirts were not a fashion statement but were because of the former statesman’s health.
<ol start="17">
<li>Nelson Mandela Coins</li>
</ol>
 An edition of the Protea coin series in honour of Nelson Mandela.
<ol start="18">
<li>Mandela Particle</li>
</ol>
 A fragment of matter found in the 70s.

18 Unusual things named in honour of Nelson Mandela that you probably never heard of

The world is celebrating the memory and legacy of one of Africa’s most illustrious leaders, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela. This year is special because it’s the <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/nelson-mandela-100">centenary celebration</a> of his birth. His leadership was important in reprioritising humanity and dignity by emphasising forgiveness and reconciliation, the protection of human rights, respect for all, and equal opportunity. Thabo Leshilo asked Cheryl Hendricks and Keith Gottschalk to reflect on <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2018/07/17/obama-s-best-quotes-from-the-mandelalecture">Barack Obama’s speech</a> commemorating Mandela’s legacy.
<hr />
Did Obama strike the right chord?
Cheryl Hendricks: Obama was chosen to give this important lecture because he represented a great deal of what Mandela stood for. And because he provided hope and inspiration for a better world during his tenure as president.
His lecture struck the right chord. It was a forceful reminder of how far humanity has come over the past century – as well as the world’s current tensions and uncertainties. It was also a reminder of how we need to keep the hope and spirit alive of a world in which social justice and democracy can prevail. A world in which tolerance, inclusivity and the pursuit of a common good is the norm.
<a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/nelson-rolihlahla-mandela">Mandela</a> was a humble, visionary, leader of international stature seeking to bridge the divides between the North and the South to promote a common humanity, to reinvigorate multilateralism, to fight inequality and provide a moral compass for the world.
His ideas about attaining peace in Africa through negotiations and mediation and creating more inclusive societies is one that still shapes conflict management on the continent. In South Africa his contribution remains his vision of a united, non-racial, non-sexist, democratic society that eschewed tribalism and patronage politics, and that promoted collective and servant leadership. He was a unifier in a deeply racially divided society.
But the last decade has seen a shift from Mandela’s vision – globally, continentally and nationally. Globally, multilateralism is under threat by rogue states, “America first” forms of engagement with its stress on national interests, and the return to militarised solutions for resolving conflicts.
For its part, the continent has lost its way in implementing the ideals of pan-Africanism. Today it’s more constrained by narrow nationalist and authoritarian politics, and by high levels of poverty and inequality.
Mandela’s legacy was probably under the most threat in South Africa itself where we had deviated substantively from integrity, humility, non-racialism, participation, eradicating inequality and empowering all.
Obama’s speech was powerful because it drew on all these themes.
Keith Gottschalk: Speaking for nearly two hours, Obama set current world events against the arc of history. His speech made a fitting centennial address for Madiba, and went down well with the frequently applauding crowd of 15 000.
What are the three most important things to take away from the speech?
Cheryl Hendricks: His key points were firstly that we are at a crossroads. What we have built and achieved over the last 100 years is being contested by those who espouse the politics of fear and resentment, fuelled by the contradictions of globalisation, failures of governance and political elites that have assumed a monopoly of power. This is manifested in xenophobia, terrorism, chauvinism, narrow nationalism, gender inequality, economic greed and authoritarianism.
It’s in direct opposition to the values, ideals and principles embodied by Madiba and the many who fought for democracy and freedom. It is uncertain which one will win. But that we need to resist the cynicism, the divisions, hatred, corruption and be guided by universal principals, love, and servant collective leadership.
Secondly, our biggest challenge is technology. Artificial intelligence threatens job security and forces us to find creative ways of generating employment.
Thirdly, democracy is still the best vehicle to achieve social justice. But it needs to be about more than just holding elections. It must be part of civic culture, and driven by young people who are passionate about building a new society.
Obama’s message is a timely one for South Africa and the world as they struggle with the complexities and contradictions of globalisation and the retreat into the politics reminiscent of an unequal authoritarian past.
He reminded us of our own duties and responsibilities to protect our democratic gains, and to continue the quest for a just, free world where all can enjoy dignity. That we are bound together, interdependent, and therefore have a common destiny. This fact should shape how we interact with one another. It’s about promoting active citizenship and the transformation of global governance institutions.
Keith Gottschalk: First, Obama pointed out that the first two decades of the 21st Century saw the world freer, healthier and wealthier than ever before. Globalisation lifted one billion people out of poverty. Violators of human rights feel on the defensive. We have reduced the prospects of war.
But he also pointed out that the previous structures of oppression and exploitation were never fully dislodged. Racial discrimination can still be found – in the US as well as South Africa.
Unlike those who predicted the triumph of liberal democracy, there are contesting narratives pitting race, ethnicity, tribalism, nationalism, or religion against not only the West, but against modernity.
We have to address the fears of those who feel left out or left behind by globalisation. We must work harder and smarter to realise Madiba’s vision for freedom.
Strong men politicians are on the ascendancy, hiding behind façade of elections, while harassing their opponents and the media.
And we have to believe in the facts. Some politicians now make stuff up, and when caught out lying show no sense of shame.
Second, unlike some free market fundamentalists, Obama more than once made the point that if we want to work for freedom, we have to fight inequality. Where you have extreme economic inequality, the wealthy elite will have wildly disproportionate political influence. We need to keep protesting and keep resisting. We need inclusive education, collective bargaining rights, and to break up monopolies. You must worry about economics if you want to get democracy to work.
Third, the struggle for basic freedoms and justice is never truly finished. Human rights require us to recognise the humanity in all persons. These are not western ideals but universal ideals. Schools should teach not blind obedience, but critical thinking.
Democracy is about more than just elections. It means listening to opposing views, not only the ones you agree with. It means working with your enemies, so they become your partners.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100141/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />Ultimately, right makes might. Madiba is an example of the politics of resilience and hope; never give in to cynicism. We need a collective spirit – young people are hope carriers. Keep believing in the vision; keep marching; keep building; raise your voice.
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/cheryl-hendricks-267661">Cheryl Hendricks</a>, Executive director, Africa Institute of South Africa, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/human-sciences-research-council-2144">Human Sciences Research Council</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/keith-gottschalk-115227">Keith Gottschalk</a>, Political Scientist, <a href="http://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-the-western-cape-1018">University of the Western Cape</a>
This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/obama-pays-tribute-to-mandela-and-invites-the-world-to-find-its-better-angels-100141">original article</a>.

Key points to take away from Obama’s speech paying tribute to Nelson Mandela

ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa’s January 8th statement

The foundation set up to guard the legacy of the late Nelson Mandela on Tuesday blamed South Africa&#8217;s President Jacob Zuma for the &#8220;wheels coming off&#8221; Africa&#8217;s most industrialised nation and urged a change in political leadership.
Since coming to power in 2009, Zuma has survived a string of corruption scandals almost unscathed. But South Africa has had to bear the cost of his antics as investors worry about its political stability, business climate and rule of law.
The non-profit Nelson Mandela Foundation, whose board consists of ten prominent South African academics, politicians and journalists, called on the African National Congress (ANC), the liberation movement once headed by Mandela and now led by Zuma, to change its leadership.
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&#8220;We call on the governing party to take the steps necessary to ensure that the vehicle of state be protected and placed in safe and capable hands,&#8221; it said in a rare statement entitled: &#8220;Time to account for crippling the state&#8221;.
Zuma&#8217;s spokesman did not answer a phone call seeking comment.
Several ANC members have called for the 74-year-old to quit but the ANC&#8217;s top echelons have backed him. In August municipal elections the ANC suffered its worst losses since taking power when apartheid fell in 1994.
Opposition parties and civic groups are planning to march in the capital Pretoria on Wednesday to demand, among other things, that he resign.
In a blow to Zuma and the ANC, Ndileka Mandela, a grandchild of Mandela, backed the foundation&#8217;s stance.
&#8220;As Grandad always said, if the ANC does what the apartheid government did, you have every right to do what we did to the apartheid government,&#8221; she said. &#8220;That statement could never be more true than now with what we are seeing happening.&#8221;
 
&#8220;FAILED&#8221;
But Zuma has shown no signs of stepping down before his second and final term as president is up in 2019, despite corruption scandals damaging him both financially and politically.
In March, the Constitutional Court ordered him to repay some of the $16 million spent on enhancing his Nkandla home in rural KwaZulu-Natal province. But Zuma weathered a motion of no-confidence in parliament over the scandal and has since paid back more than $500,000.
The Mandela Foundation said the court ruling over Nkandla was an example of how Zuma had failed to uphold the constitution. &#8220;It is increasingly a national consensus that he has failed the test,&#8221; it said.
Zuma is also entangled in a scandal around the alleged political influence of a trio of wealthy brothers. About a hundred protesters chanted slogans against Zuma outside a court in Pretoria where his lawyers were trying to delay the release of a report on the matter.
The president also faced accusations of meddling after fraud charges against Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan were unexpectedly dropped on Monday. [L8N1CY2Z2]
Near record unemployment and a stagnant economy have exacerbated discontent with Zuma&#8217;s government, which also failed to end weeks of often violent student demonstrations over the cost of university education.
The Mandela Foundation said it had seen a weakening of law enforcement bodies under Zuma and supported &#8220;the demand to hold to account those responsible for compromising our democratic state and looting its resources.&#8221;﻿

Mandela

The future of South Africa: 30 years of democracy and beyond

“We dip our heads in honour” – Ramaphosa lauds the late Bizos

George Bizos- the man who helped save Mandela’s neck

How a brutal torturer saved Andrew Mlangeni from death by drowning.

End of an era: firebrand Andrew Mlangeni the last of Nelson Mandela’s band of brothers dies aged 95.

“It is high treason chaps!”- How the joy of reading could have put Nelson Mandela and his struggle comrades behind bars.

Zindzi Mandela dies aged 59

Farewell one of the last survivors of Mandela’s band of brothers: Denis Goldberg – the gentle lion of the struggle.

One of the last of Mandela’s band of brothers is gone – freedom fighter Denis Goldberg passes away.

DRC elections: Downpours,no internet drudgery and a fisherman’s find on the way to a Mandela- inspired tomorrow?

Oprah celebrates women and Mandela at the Isithunzi Sabafazi dialogue

iMadiba installation launched in Sandton

18 Unusual things named in honour of Nelson Mandela that you probably never heard of

Key points to take away from Obama’s speech paying tribute to Nelson Mandela

ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa’s January 8th statement

Mandela Foundation blames Zuma, calls for leadership change

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Mandela

The future of South Africa: 30 years of democracy and beyond

“We dip our heads in honour” – Ramaphosa lauds the late Bizos

George Bizos- the man who helped save Mandela’s neck

How a brutal torturer saved Andrew Mlangeni from death by drowning.

End of an era: firebrand Andrew Mlangeni the last of Nelson Mandela’s band of brothers dies aged 95.

“It is high treason chaps!”- How the joy of reading could have put Nelson Mandela and his struggle comrades behind bars.

Zindzi Mandela dies aged 59

Farewell one of the last survivors of Mandela’s band of brothers: Denis Goldberg – the gentle lion of the struggle.

One of the last of Mandela’s band of brothers is gone – freedom fighter Denis Goldberg passes away.

DRC elections: Downpours,no internet drudgery and a fisherman’s find on the way to a Mandela- inspired tomorrow?

Oprah celebrates women and Mandela at the Isithunzi Sabafazi dialogue

iMadiba installation launched in Sandton

18 Unusual things named in honour of Nelson Mandela that you probably never heard of

Key points to take away from Obama’s speech paying tribute to Nelson Mandela

ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa’s January 8th statement

Mandela Foundation blames Zuma, calls for leadership change

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