The Life of Nelson Mandela
He was born on July 18, 1918, in Mvezo, in the Eastern Cape, to the Madiba clan. Nkosi Mphakanyiswa Gadla Mandela, main counsellor to the Acting King of the Thembu people, Jongintaba Dalindyebo, was his father, and his mother Nonqaphi Nosekeni was his mother. As a 12-year-old in 1930, Rolihlahla's father died and he was taken in by Jongintaba in Mqhekezweni's Great Place.
A young man who had grown up hearing about the courage of his forebearers throughout the wars of resistance dreamt of joining in the fight for independence as a young man.
Qunu elementary school teacher, Miss Mdingane, gave him Nelson as a "Christian" name in line with the tradition of naming all school children.
University College of Fort Hare, where Mandela started his studies, expelled him for participating in a student demonstration, therefore he did not finish his degree there.
When he returned to the Great Place at Mqhekezweni, the King was enraged and threatened to arrange marriages for him and his cousin Justice if he didn't return to Fort Hare. Instead, they fled to Johannesburg, where they arrived in 1941. While there, he worked as a mine security guard and was introduced to Lazer Sidelsky by estate agent Walter Sisulu. Witkin, Eidelman, and Sidelsky, a law company, helped him write his articles.
In 1943, after completing his BA at the University of South Africa, he returned to Fort Hare to get his diploma.
Meanwhile, he enrolled at the University of the Witwatersrand to pursue an LLB degree. According to his own admissions, he was a lousy student and dropped out of college in 1952 without completing his education. After being imprisoned in 1962, he resumed his studies at the University of London, although he never finished his degree.
He received his LLB from the University of South Africa in 1989, during the last months of his jail sentence. In Cape Town, he received his diploma in absentia.
He joined the African National Congress (ANC) in 1944, when he helped organise the ANC Youth League, although he had been actively engaged in politics since 1942. (ANCYL).
He married Evelyn Mase, a nurse and Walter Sisulu's cousin, in 1944. Besides Madiba Thembi "Thembi" and Makgatho, they had two boys named Thembi and Makgatho as well as two girls named Makaziwe, the first of whom died when she was a baby. In 1958, he and his wife split up.
Deputy National Volunteer-in-Chief Maulvi Cachalia was appointed to his position in 1952 as part of the Defiance Campaign. The ANC and the South African Indian Congress collaborated on this civil disobedience campaign against six unfair laws. For his role in the campaign, he and 19 others were tried under the Suppression of Communism Act and were sentenced to nine months of hard labour, suspended for two years.
Mandela was able to practise law after completing a two-year legal diploma in addition to his BA, and he and Oliver Tambo opened Mandela & Tambo in August 1952, South Africa's first black-owned law company in the 1950s.
The first time he was banned was at the end of 1952. On June 26, 1955, in Kliptown, South Africa, he was only allowed to observe the adoption of the Freedom Charter in secret.
Trial for High Treason
On December 5, 1956, a nationwide police operation led to the arrest of Nelson Mandela, which sparked the 1956 Treason Trial. All races were represented in the lengthy trial, which concluded on March 29, 1961, when the last 28 defendants, including Nelson Mandela, were declared not guilty.
Winnie Madikizela, a social worker, and Mandela were married on June 14, 1958, during the course of the trial. Zenani and Zindziswa, their daughters, were born to them. When the pair split up, it happened in 1996.
All-in Africa Conference in Pietermaritzburg decided that Mandela should write to Prime Minister Verwoerd and warn him that if he refused to hold a national convention on non-racial constitution, there would be a nationwide strike against South Africa becoming a republic if he did not comply. Mandela went into hiding after he and his co-defendants were found not guilty of treason in the Treason Trial and started arranging a nationwide strike for the 29th, 30th, and 31st of March.
The walkout was called off early due to the large mobilisation of state security. Assembled in June 1961, Umkhonto weSizwe (Spear of the Nation) began its armed campaign on December 16, 1961, with a series of explosions.
In 1949, the ANC adopted a more radical mass-based programme, the Program of Action, as a result of Mandela's rise through the ranks of the ANCYL.
On January 11, 1962, Nelson Mandela fled South Africa under the assumed name David Motsamayi. During his time in Africa and England, he sought help for the armed resistance. In July 1962, he returned to South Africa after completing military training in Morocco and Ethiopia. On his way back from KwaZulu-Natal, where he informed ANC President Chief Albert Luthuli on his journey, he was detained at a police roadblock near Howick on the 5th of August.
Leaving the country without a permission and instigating a strike were two of the charges brought against him at the time. At the Pretoria Local Jail, he was sentenced to five years in prison and started serving his term. A month later, on June 12, 1963, he returned to Pretoria from Robben Island. It was just a matter of time until authorities invaded the ANC and Communist Party's secret refuge in Rivonia, Johannesburg, Liliesleaf.
Mandela and 10 others were put on trial for sabotage during the Rivonia Trial on October 9, 1963. In his "Speech from the Dock" on April 20, 1964, while he was facing the death sentence, his last comments to the court were immortalised:
By 1964, Nelson Mandela and seven others had been convicted and condemned to life in prison on June 11, 1964; the following day, they were sentenced to death by firing squad. While the other prisoners were taken to Robben Island, Goldberg was sent to Pretoria Prison.
Nelson Mandela's mother died in 1968 and his oldest son Thembi died a year later. No, he couldn't attend their memorial services.
On March 31, 1982, Mandela, Sisulu, Mhlaba, and Mlangeni were all moved to Pollsmoor Prison in Cape Town. In October, Kathrada joined the group. Mandela was detained alone when he returned to jail in November 1985 after prostate surgery. His hospital visit from Justice Minister Kobie Coetsee was heartwarming. As time went on, Mandela began exploring the possibility of a last meeting between the apartheid regime and the ANC
The end of incarceration
TB was diagnosed on August 12, 1988, when he was rushed to the hospital. His last 14 months in jail were spent in a residence at Victor Verster Prison in Paarl, where he was sent on 7 December 1988 after spending more than three months in two hospitals. he was liberated from its gates on February 11th, 1990, only nine days after the ANC was unbanned and almost four months after his surviving Rivonia companions were freed. During his incarceration, he refused at least three offers of conditional release.
He was sworn in as South Africa's first democratically elected president on May 10, 1994. In 1998, on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, he married Graça Machel, the third of his three wives.
In 1999, Nelson Mandela resigned as President of South Africa after serving just one term. As he had done since 1995, he continued to work with the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund and formed the Nelson Mandela Foundation as well as the Mandela Rhodes Foundation.
Nelson Mandela's commitment to democracy, equality, and education never wavered. When confronted with ad hominem insults, he never responded with more prejudice. All those who are oppressed and destitute, as well as those who fight injustice and hardship, may learn from his example.
On December 5, 2013, he died at his home in Johannesburg.
