Nelson Mandela, who was born on July 18, 1918, was the son of the head of the Tembu tribe, an ethnic group of the Kosa. His first name, which was given at birth, is Rolihlahla, which means ‘to tear a branch of a tree’ in the Kos language, a figurative sense that means troublemaker (Sewpaul 699). Nelson studied at the school at the Methodist Church, Hilltown College in Fort Beaufort, then at University College in Fort Hare. He was expelled from the university because, as a member of the representative student council, he did not want to give in to the university administration in negotiations regarding student meals. Since 1942, combining his studies with work in a law office in Johannesburg. Although he did not have enough time to study, he ended up passing the qualifying exam in order to become a lawyer. Nelson then became part of the African National Congress (ANC), a party that advocated the elimination of the apartheid regime and the rule of the white minority in the country.
Nomzamo Winnie (Winnifred) Madikisela-Mandela was born on September 26, 1936, in Bizan, Pondoland, Transkei. Winnie is the daughter of a pair of teachers belonging to the main Tembu family. From 1953 she attended the Jan Hofmeier School of Social Work in Johannesburg and was the first black social worker to pass exams in 1956. In 1992, she received her Ph.D (Hassim 1159) in Medicine from the University of Johannesburg. Winnie then worked at Baragwanath Hospital in Johannesburg, where she was politicized by her work as a social worker. In 1958, when she became an active member of the African National Congress (ANC). Her radicalism and fearlessness made her a symbol of youth protests that erupted in Soweto in 1976, so she led her husband’s movement while he was imprisoned against the white government.
In mid-1952, the ANC and other organizations launched a campaign of defiance of discriminatory laws, led by Mandela. He traveled and explained the campaign’s goals and methods all over the country, after which he was arrested. Speaking at the trial in the case of high treason, Mandela explained that his ideal is a multiracial, classless society and that the ANC, in his opinion, could achieve democracy through not revolution. Still, the expansion of voting rights and the Freedom Charter provided not for the elimination of capitalism but only for monopoly mining companies. During this period, Nelson Mandela gained worldwide fame and became one of the symbols of the struggle against apartheid in Southern Africa. In February 1991, Nelson Mandela was released from prison, and three years later, he was elected by the new parliament as the country’s first black president (Ciulla 2). Five years after, in 1999, he made a farewell speech and retired from active politics.
As Nelson continued to work on his vision of peaceful system change on Robben Island, where he was imprisoned, Winnie delved deeper into the issues of day-to-day racist politics. Its political power was based on Madikizela-Mandela’s ability to combine the daily life of black people in a racist state with their own individual lives (Hassim 897). Mandela was accused of preparing for a terrorist act several times and was jailed for 1.5 years. After the massive protests in 1976, when several hundred students died, she was exiled to the town of Brandfort for seven years. Winnie Mandela has held a number of government posts in South Africa and led the African National Women’s Congress league. She is well known as the mother of the nation and a veteran of the fight against apartheid, Winnie Mandela died in a Johannesburg hospital at the age of 81 due to a long illness. In June 2013, Nelson Mandela was admitted to the Heart Medical Hospital in Pretoria, and on December 5, Mandela, along with his family, died from the effects of pneumonia.
Nelson Mandela began fighting for the rights of black Africans as Chairman of the African National Congress ANC Youth League. As Mahatma Gandhi showed in India, Mandela also developed the concept of peaceful protest, however, his organization was banned by the state, and Mandela was ordered not to leave the country. On August 19, he also founded the Nelson Mandela Foundation, which aims to ideally continue his life’s work and the history of the anti-apartheid movement. Nelson Mandela is a famous figure of freedom and justice who has campaigned under the motto The fight is my life and has successfully struggled for the rights of blacks in Africa. In the issues against racial segregation in Africa, civil rights activist spouses Mandela have survived everything, including thirty years of captivity. During his presidency, he enacted new laws and thus ended apartheid: whites and blacks finally became equal, and Nelson Mandela became their hero. Even after his presidency ended in 1999, Mandela was zealous in fighting political injustice, which is why Nelson and Vinnie Mandela are some of the most important civil rights activists in history.
Works Cited
Ciulla, Joanne B. “Searching for Mandela: The Insights of Biographical Research.” Leadership, vol. 12, no. 2, 2016, pp. 186–197, Web.
Hassim, Shireen. “Not Just Nelson’s Wife: Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, Violence and Radicalism in South Africa.” Journal of Southern African Studies, vol. 44, no. 5, 2018, pp. 895–912, Web.
Hassim, Shireen. “The Impossible Contract: The Political and Private Marriage of Nelson and Winnie Mandela.” Journal of Southern African Studies, vol. 45, no. 6, 2019, pp. 1151–1171, Web.
Sewpaul, Vishantie. “Politics with Soul: Social Work and the Legacy of Nelson Mandela.” International Social Work, vol. 59, no. 6, 2016, pp. 697–708, Web.