Winnie Mandela

The Africana QA: Winnie Mandela 
 
"As long as my people are dying of AIDS, and suffering from racism, and
as long as South Africa still remains a blistering inferno of racial history, 
I will remain what I am." The woman is still a warrior.

 
By Tanu T. Henry 
 
In the 1980s, Winnie Mandela's emotional fire and unblinking courage
attracted global sympathy to the cause and ordeal of Nelson Mandela, her
then-imprisoned then-husband. Her courage helped draw attention to the
plight of all black South Africans during the country's apartheid
regime. Since then, though, she's faced an increasingly critical
reception as she bumbled through a thicket of scandals, a
highly-publicized divorce, and finally her alleged involvement in the
1989 murder of a 14-year-old Soweto youth activist, Stompie Seipei. Most
recently, she's been charged with embezzling some $100,000 from the
African National Congress, her former husband's political party. She
denies both charges. 

At 68, Mandela looks older than she did during the divestment era, but
she's still stunning. She seemed calmer than before, as if she's mostly
forged her passion into a more temperate commitment to her various
causes. Still, like everyone's favorite outrageous aunt, she's capable
of the occasional fiery retort and catty sotto voce pronouncement. 

As a precondition, I was asked not to inquire about Seipei's murder or
the fraud charges. But she did share her thoughts on the African
National Congress, President Thabo Mbeki, Nelson Mandela and other
global issues like Zimbabwe's land reform program, the pending war with
Iraq, South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Affirmative
Action. 

I read that you want to go to Iraq as a human shield. What motivates
that decision? 

I was misquoted. I said I believe that war in any country belongs to
mothers more than it belongs to men. I was suggesting that South Africa
send a delegation of women to Saddam Hussein. And I would be honored to
lead that delegation. We have that painful history - we have seen
thousands of our children perish in the struggle. And at the end of the
day, they are not the beneficiaries of any war. South Africa suggested
sending a delegation of war experts, nine men, to Iraq and no one ever
thought about the mothers who bring this life, who gave birth to Saddam
Hussein himself. We are the ones who suffer the loss of these lives in
the event of war. I am totally against war. No one wants to see life
lost. And one life lost is one too many. 

What is your role in the South African government now? 

I am the head of the Women's League of the African National Congress,
ANC - that is just the women's wing of the ANC. What occupies us is
exactly what occupies government. We are engaged in preventive measures
to help stem the scourge of HIV. We have passed that stage of just
dealing with feminist issues. Women have common experiences, but I am
not one of those feminists who believe that there are separate women's
issues and separate men's issues. I fought right alongside men during
the revolution. 

What do you think about the Thabo Mbeki? Do you think he's doing enough
to create the new, multiracial and democratic South Africa? 

Within his capacity he is addressing very difficult issues. You must
remember that we come from a very painful past. We cannot undo, just in
his term of office, what has been done by the Afrikaners, the ruling
white racist regimes of yesteryear. To undo that just in his term will
be a miracle. 

What about former President Nelson Mandela? 

Mandela, too. What they have all done so far is within their own
limitations. It is a country that was bled dry by apartheid, ravaged by
racism. It is not easy to level those playing fields. It is going to
take some time. Some feel that we are not transforming South Africa
quickly enough. But we are doing the best we can to address those
economic and social inequalities. 

What do you think about  President Mbeki's view that HIV does not cause
AIDS? 

I can only speak for myself. I think President Mbeki's views can best be
explained by himself. I believe HIV causes AIDS. I believe in the
scientific explanation of AIDS and we have had personal experiences.
There are very few families in South Africa that have not experienced a
loss of a family member from AIDS. My brother's children have died from
AIDS. Politicians should stick to politics and scientists should deal
with issues like AIDS. 

Britain has criticized South Africa for not taking a firm stance against
Robert Mugabe's controversial land reform program. Do you think the
South African government has been critical enough? 

I don't think South Africa should have to monitor its neighbor where
there is a democratically elected government. I may have my own personal
views, which I wouldn't like to express because I don't want to pretend
to be an expert. 

What are those views? 

In South Africa, the struggle was about land. When we fought as
ferociously as we did, we were fighting for our land. Whether Mugabe is
fighting for his land in a different manner, I don't know. That is an
issue that should be decided by the people of Zimbabwe. 

What do you think about the African Union, though? Wouldn't that
require, by nature, more interdependence and intervention between
countries? 

Any attempt to rectify the ills of the continent, any attempt to try and
improve on what the Organization of African Unity stood for, would be
welcomed if it brought about change. If the African Union has policies
that are not just a repetition of the OAU, then it will be welcome. In a
theoretical sense it is a good move, but practically, it will have to
stand the test of history. 

What do you think about reparations? 

I believe the rich boys of the G-8 nations owe Africa a hell of a lot.
Africa was looted by the so-called first world. Take gold, for example:
even today, in the year 2003, gold is taken out of South Africa and
comes back to us as finished products that we buy for ten times as much.
The first world owes the so-called third world. They should return our
wealth in the form of injecting the continent with capital to improve
the lives of the people. 

The affirmative action debate is heating up in South Africa. Some whites
fear that they are losing opportunities to less-qualified and under-qualified
blacks. 

To utter hell with white fears! How can blacks be sufficiently qualified
when they were never given the opportunities? Apartheid meant that black
journalists were self-created because they were not university products.
They came from a disadvantaged people with no resources or access to go
to Grahamstown University or Rhodes University to study journalism. Most
of our black journalists are self-made. So when you introduce that
transformation, where do you expect to get a pool of trained journalists? 
Whites want gradual affirmative action, and we are nine years into liberation
 - but they occupy senior positions in every sphere of our lives. 

Do you think the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was successful? 

I don't think I should answer that. I have my own views about that. 

What are they? 

My view, which belongs to me, not the ANC, is that the Truth and
Reconciliation Commission will need its own Truth and Reconciliation
Commission one day. I don't know how much we achieved by getting
criminals to stand in the TRC, pronounce half-truths, reveal a quarter
of the crimes they committed and by virtue of them presenting themselves
before the TRC, they get away with murder. No one can swear that they
revealed the truth of the atrocities they committed during those years.
Maybe, South Africa should have gone the way of Nuremberg, where people
were just tried for war crimes. What happens to the families of the
victims of a man who says he doesn't even remember the number of
killings he was responsible for? But because he told that truth he is
given amnesty. That is the problem. 

There has  been an emergence of the landless people movement in South
Africa. I'm curious to know what you think about it? 

I was in the forefront of fighting for land. I am very sympathetic to
people who are fighting for land. Our association with the land is far
deeper than many people realize. When an African child is born, his or
her umbilical cord is traditionally buried within the homestead, on the
grounds. The relationship between persons and the land is so deep, that
I cannot find faults with anyone fighting for land. That is what the
Freedom Charter said in 1955: the land belongs to all who live on it and
till it. 

You remain very popular with the people, the grassroots, of South Africa
although you're at odds with the leadership of the ANC. Do you have
political ambitions of your own? Maybe someday organizing a separate
party? 

Do I see myself as against myself? I am the African National Congress. 

But you're very critical of the ANC... 

I am not just critical of the African National Congress. I am also
critical of myself. When I say we are not moving fast enough, I am
merely speaking the truth. Not because I am part of the government. I am
not going to say that the struggles of the landless people are not
justified. I am not going to say that HIV does not cause AIDS. I merely
speak the truth. And speaking the truth does not contextualize me in any
given ideology. 

Has the apartheid-era passion been sucked out of the ANC now that it is
playing a leadership role in South Africa? 

I wish I had an answer to that. Sometimes, I pose the same question
myself. I cannot interpret what goes on in the minds of my colleagues. I
would love to think that we have the same passion we had when we dug the
trenches and fought in the revolution. My particular problem is that I
fought in the forefront of that struggle. I fought in the revolution. I
fought underground. I was so much of that struggle. It cannot be taken
out of me even if I wanted to do that. That's why I still live in
Soweto. I cannot divorce myself from that struggle. 

Thabo Mbeki turned away from your embrace at the 25th anniversary of the
Soweto Massacre in 2001. Is this conflict... 

It's a closed chapter now. It's history. 

What is your relationship with Nelson Mandela like now? Do you still
communicate? 

I never talk about that. As I've said before, I was not Mandela's
product politically. Nor was he mine. Of course, it would have never
worked - he's twice my age! I really don't talk about things like that.
I have defined myself in terms of the revolution, my political life. 

How do you want to be remembered? 

I should leave that to you. Right? I don't think anyone plans that. I
don't think anyone in the same position plans that. How do you even
begin to define me? I don't even know how to define myself. 

Do you have any regrets? 

If I had to live my life again, I would start from day one and do
exactly the same thing all over again. The struggle was my opium and I
am still addicted to it. For as long as my people are dying of AIDS, and
suffering from racism, and as long as South Africa still remains a
blistering inferno of racial history, I will remain what I am. 
 
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First published: March 3, 2003  
 
About the Author

Tanu T. Henry is an Africana staff writer.