Book: Long walk to freedom.
Writer: Nelson Mandela
“No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than it’s opposite”
Nelson Mandela made a significant contribution to his nation’s protracted fight for liberation from white domination as a social rights activist, anti-apartheid leader, and philanthropist. But, what distinguished him from other revolutionaries of the era was his nonviolent and militant struggle against the South African government and its racial Apartheid policy. In a world where Western nations are still struggling for equal rights for black people, he continues to be an inspiration today.
Nelson Mandela was honored with awards like the Gandhi Peace Award and the Lenin Peace Prize in addition to receiving the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 for his pivotal role in his nation’s emancipation and his admirable efforts as a human rights advocate. Nelson Mandela wrote a lot about his upbringing and the battle he fought to end apartheid. The book he wrote, “Long Walk to Freedom,” is a history of his life and the years he spent behind bars. It’s still relevant today, just as it was when he battled racial injustice.
Everyone who is concerned about the panic surrounding white supremacy should take note of the fact that this plunge into total insanity lasted for more than 40 years (without even taking into consideration the racist system that preceded it). We should never stop marveling at the miracle of the African National Congress’s emergence from this soul-dimming darkness. The African National Congress is a non-racial party bursting with outstanding men and women.
Petitions were tried by blacks, Indians, and people of color. Passive resistance was attempted. Prisons became overcrowded. They took up arms at Mandela’s request after every attempt to appeal to their humanity was rejected with greater force. No one can blame them. The focal point of both his life and this book is Mandela’s trial at Rivonia, where he was tried for doing just that. Mandela, Sisulu, Mbeki, and the others did not flinch when they were accused of inciting an armed uprising and confronted with the nearly inevitable death penalty, but Nelson stood on the dock and spoke the following indelible words, almost asking to be hanged – “I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons will live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal for which I hope to live for and to see realized.”
Incredibly, no one was executed, but a few people—including Mandela—received life sentences or sentences that were very near to it, and they were transferred to Robben Island for what ended up being the majority of their remaining lives. I can vouch for the fascinating experience of viewing Robben Island from the summit of Table Mountain in Cape Town. The significance of the sight for common South Africans at the time is something I can only speculate about. There the old lion spent decades working in a lime quarry, gardening, writing petitions for fellow inmates, dismantling the prison’s apartheid system where blacks would receive poorer food than Indians (and so on, up to whites), and opposing drunken warders (he was a powerhouse). The reader may not find the shift in location all that noteworthy because the South Africa he had just fled resembled a prison more than anything else. To put it another way, the sound of revolution never stops in this book.
Mandela constructed himself a home that was based on his final cell when he finally left jail after serving 27 years. He saw the militant as having become a yogi, therefore imprisonment and independence were the same to him. Even his oppressors had been pardoned by him Mandela’s election to the presidency is not covered in the book. I prefer this resolution and would rather not concentrate on Mandela’s own flaws in foreign policy as well as the steadily declining standards of South African leaders who came after him, which reached an all-time low under Jacob Zuma’s despicable rule.
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Writer:-
Sanzida Rahman Jidni
Intern, Content writing Department
YSSE