by Madikizela-Mandela, Winnie; Kathrada, Ahmed; Kathrada, Ahmed
It was indeed very kind of you to allow me to acquire Piet Meiring’s ‘Ons Eerste Ses Premiers’. I am really eager to go through it. The only difficult[y] I might experience in this regard is that reading such material often tends to whet one’s appetite. Perhaps one day I may be able to thank you personally for the gesture.
Finally, I should like you to know that it was a pleasure for me to be able to exchange views with you on matters of mutual concern. Your statement that the problems of our country will be solved by blacks and whites together coincides with my own views. Carried to its logical conclusion, and objectively applied, such an approach could provide a solid basis for harmonising the common efforts of all South Africans in working out lasting solutions. I sincerely hope your efforts in this regard may bring rich rewards. Mag dit goed gaan!233
Yours sincerely,
Nelson Mandela 466/64
It has been [a] valuable experience for me to watch powerful organisations and highly-placed individuals clubbing together for the specific purpose of destroying a virtually widowed woman; how all these can stoop so low as to bring to my notice all sorts of details calculated to dim the clear image I have about the most wonderful friend I have in life completely baffles me. My consolation has always been that you’ve kept your head, held the family tight together and made us as happy and optimistic as circumstances would allow a girl who’s live[d] under heavy and sustained pressure from all directions. Of course, dear Mum, we’re but human Zeni, Zindzi and I and we’d like you to be highly praised by all and all the time just like the lady who rose from the valley of the Caledon in the 1820s. But the more you’re slandered, the more attached to you do I become. These are not the things we should even mention in our correspondence to each other. But we live 1 000 miles apart, see each other rarely and for short periods and with all the jazz around your ears you may even wonder what Madiba thinks. Only because of this do I think I should, nonetheless, say to you that I LOVE YOU ALWAYS.— NELSON MANDELA IN A LETTER TO WINNIE MANDELA, 19 AUGUST 1976
100. Madiba Thembekile ‘Thembi’ Mandela.
101. From Joel Carlson, No Neutral Ground (London: Davis-Poynter Ltd, 1973). It refers to the way in which she received the news that her stepson was killed in a car accident on 13 July.
102. Nelson Mandela’s prison number.
103. Her brother-in-law.
104. Joel Carlson, Nelson Mandela’s attorney.
105. University exams. He was studying law by correspondence.
106. Winnie Mandela’s sister.
107. Their daughters.
108. Winnie Mandela’s stepmother in her home town of Bizana.
109. Sefton Vutela, the husband of Winnie Mandela’s sister Nali.
110. Gibson Kente.
111. Various friends and relatives.
112. Nelson Mandela’s initiation name.
113. The family home in Soweto.
114. The conditions of her banning order.
115. Winnie Mandela’s youngest sister Nonyaniso, who was detained at the same time.
116. An affectionate name for Winnie Mandela – an abbreviation of her first name Nomzamo.
117. Winnie Mandela’s sister Nali Nancy Vutela, who was married to Sefton Vutela.
118. A cousin of Nelson Mandela.
119. In 1962 Nelson Mandela had met Moosa Dinath, who was in jail for fraud. Nelson had Winnie Mandela meet his wife Maud Katzenellenbogen and they became friends. However, they were both later disillusioned with them.
120. Mandela’s second eldest son Makgatho with his first wife Evelyn Mase.
121. Gibson Kente.
122. Activist and friend Lilian Ngoyi.
123. A name for Winnie Mandela.
124. For her first visit to her husband on Robben Island since his conviction in the Rivonia Trial.
125. Nelson Mandela’s cousin, a chief who negotiated his marriage to Winnie Madikizela.
126. Wonga Mbekeni’s sister.
127. Winnie Mandela’s younger sister was detained around the same time.
128. Nombulelo Mtirara, a sister of Sabata.
129. Nelson’s Mandela’s cousin’s daughter.
130. Nqonqoloza Mtirara, Nelson Mandela’s aunt.
131. Chief Jonguhlanga, Nelson Mandela’s cousin.
132. NoEngland was the wife of the Regent Jongintaba.
133. Nelson Mandela’s relative.
134. Cousins of Nelson Mandela.
135. Mendel Levin was an attorney suggested by Maud Katzenellenbogen. He planned to defend Winnie Mandela in her trial but she ultimately chose Joel Carlson.
136. Nelson Mandela’s mother who died in September 1968.
137. Thembi’s widow.
138. Mhlope is a nickname for Winnie Mandela.
139. Mangosuthu Buthelezi’s wife.
140. Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi.
141. In Johannesburg.
142. Handwritten note at the bottom: ‘Send in the ordinary way to Brig Aucamp.’ – signed and dated 5/8/69.
143. Handwritten note at the top in Afrikaans: ‘Nelson Mandela 466/64 Letter to Brig Aucamp.’
144. His attorneys.
145. Handwritten note at top in Afrikaans: ‘Nelson Mandela 466/64 Special letter to his wife’.
146. Winnie Mandela.
147. Winnie Mandela’s maternal aunt.
148. Nobatembu Mtirara’s daughter.
149. Uncle in the isiXhosa language.
150. The wife of his comrade, Wilton Mkwayi, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in the Little Rivonia Trial.
151. Jawaharlal Nehru of India.
152. Children of Nelson Mandela’s cousin.
153. Maud Katzenellenbogen.
154. Their anniversary is on 14 June, she received it four months late.
155. Suppression of Communism.
156. A friend in Swaziland who often looked after Zeni and Zindzi in the school holidays.
157. The hostel in Jeppe in which Winnie Mandela stayed while she was studying at the Jan Hofmeyr School of Social Work in Johannesburg.
158. Winnie Mandela’s nickname for Kaiser Matanzima.
159. ‘This young man who made me part with you is powerful.’
160. Baragwanath Hospital.
161. The police would check if she was at home as stipulated in her banning order.
162. King of the Thembus.
163. An isiXhosa term meaning ‘sister’.
164. A name for Winnie Mandela.
165. Madikizela.
166. Amina Cachalia.
167. Lilian Ngoyi.
168. Nelson Mandela’s first wife, Evelyn Mase.
169. Winnie Mandela’s uncle.
170. Mzala is a name for cousin and Khati is Kathaza, Mandela’s cousin’s daughter.
171. Winnie Mandela’s father, Columbus Madikizela.
172. An isiXhosa word meaning ‘cousins’.
173. Nelson Mandela’s sister Leabie.
174. Thembi’s widow, Thoko.
175. Chief Ntambozenqanawa Mtirara, Nelson Mandela’s cousin.
176. Chief Jongintaba Mdingi, who had the right to name Nelson Mandela’s children.
177. Letter from the National Archives.
178. Jane Xaba is the sister of Marshall Xaba.
179. A pseudonym for Adelaide Tambo.
180. The wife of political activist Moses Kotane.
181. Brother.
182. Date unknown.
183. Also known as Thoko.
184. A handwritten note, presumbley by a prison official, reads ‘Censors kindly discuss 3.6.70’.
185. Name for brother/brother-in-law.
186. Nelson Mandela’s cousin.
187. Another of his three sisters.
188. His nephew Kaiser Matanzima.
189. Connie’s husband.
190. Note in another hand writes here: ‘Approved 3.6.70’.
191. Note in another hand: ‘Approved’.
192. Note in another hand in Afrikaans
: ‘Regard as special letter’.
193. My love.
194. Mashumi Paul Mzaidume.
195. 10 March 1957 is when Winnie Madikizela and Nelson Mandela went on their first date.
196. Jane Xaba’s brother.
197. A female with a university degree.
198. Brother.
199. 14 June 1969.
200. Winnie Mandela’s official date of birth is 26 September 1936 which would make her 21 at the time she was married, but it is a guestimate as she is not sure of her exact date of birth.
201. Fulfil your promise . . . Let all the nations of the world, Receive salvation . . . Behold our nation, And forgive its misdeeds.
202. Similar to the Terrorism Act, Proclamation 400 was used to proclaim emergency regulations and detain people without trial. It was introduced in 1960 and used by the Matanzima regime in Transkei.
203. Neighbours.
204. Lady Birley, wife of Sir Robert Birley, the former head of Eton.
205. Oliver Tambo.
206. Market in Johannesburg.
207. Donaldson Orlando Community Centre in Soweto.
208. Treason Trial, 1956–61.
209. Bantu Men’s Social Centre in Johannesburg.
210. Fatima Meer.
211. Robert Resha.
212. High school.
213. Butter him up – porridge with butter.
214. Stiff porridge with milk.
215. Salt-free soft porridge.
216. Soft porridge.
217. The 10th of March 1957 was the day they had their first date.
218. Winnie Mandela’s brother.
219. Shanti Naidoo.
220. Security Branch of the South African Police.
221. Traditional drink of sour milk.
222. Helen Joseph.
223. Shanti Naidoo was detained for six months and forced to stand for five days and nights but had refused to testify against Winnie Mandela. She was sentenced to two months.
224. An isiXhosa word meaning brother.
225. Winnie Mandela’s sister and her husband Sefton Vutela.
226. Fatima Meer.
227. David Astor, the editor of the Observer in London.
228. Adelaide and Paul Joseph, activists in exile in England.
229. Mary Benson, activist in exile in London.
230. Note from prison official.
231. The letter has a stamp on it dated 24 February 1975.
232. Advocate Bram Fischer who defended Nelson Mandela and his colleagues in the Rivonia Trial was himself sentenced to life imprisonment in 1966. He contracted cancer in April 1975 and was sent from prison and placed under house arrest in his brother’s house in Bloemfontein. He died on 8 May 1975.
233. Go well.
Epilogue
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela
When the pages that make up this journal were returned to me after so many years I did not want to read them. I was afraid. There are memories you keep in a part of your brain; it is part of those things that hurt so much you do not want to remember. Getting it back after more than 40 years probed that particular part of the brain that had stored it.
I never thought I wanted to revisit those times. But at the same time I was glad that one could have a glimpse, a little peek through that window of darkness and relive those times for the sake of posterity, to be able to tell our children and grandchildren what we went through.
I was fearful to go through that again, afraid of hurting myself and hurting my children because in hindsight you cannot help but think, ‘What did I do to my children?’
That is the truth; that was the physical experience. That was why I was so scared to revisit that period because seeing those pages of handwritten notes and diaries brought back that fateful day. My children, Zindzi and Zeni, were clinging to my skirt crying, ‘Mummy, Mummy don’t go.’ It was about 2.30 or 3am and they were used to these knocks. The authorities would knock at the door, knock at the windows, kick the doors in and break the windows. But that day I knew I was going for a long period of time. So I went into prison against that background and I did not know whether the children would survive. I did not know where they were going to take them to because the police who arrested me never even asked me where they should take them. It was God’s luck that at that age they remembered my elder sister’s name. Zeni was ten years old and Zindzi was eight. I learnt after a month that they were actually with my elder sister.
I already had a bag. I always had this bag packed because the children were too young to bring me clothes in prison and I had been arrested so often. I was not permitted to have an adult at home because I was under house arrest and speaking to me was tantamount to having leprosy – you were infecting yourself because you were bound to be arrested. So I ended up not communicating with people, trying to protect them. This even applied to my own family. I could not even take the children to my sister.
I did not know what my fate would be because we were part of an experiment – the first ever to be detained under Section 6 of the then Terrorism Act. They were using me as a barometer, a political barometer. If they could arrest this number one terrorist and number one terrorist’s wife then they could measure the political heat in the country and how the country was going to react. After Madiba’s arrest, he was in prison for life and I was this ‘communist’ who was continuing where others had left off. So arresting me was the highest point in their lives – they knew they had completely thwarted opposition to their nationalist government policies. I was aware that I was being used as a barometer to test the reaction of the country. If they could take his wife, when there was so much noise when he was arrested and jailed for life, what did the nationalists have to worry about thereafter? They were going to just sit back and rest and rule forever.
So I was arrested in that atmosphere and I knew my fate was in those people’s hands and I knew no one would have the courage to open their mouth because apartheid meant murder in those days. If you dared oppose the nationalists, you were dead. Once this lawyer came to me at midnight to find out how I could help him leave the country. I was doing a lot of that in those days. The Security Branch happened to get this information and they detained him in John Vorster Square. The following day he was dead. That is how vicious apartheid was then – our lives were nothing.
When we arrived at Pretoria Central Prison, we were all held in a certain section of the prison. Then I was removed and placed on death row, in that cell with three doors – the grille door, then the actual prison door and then another grille door. The sound of that key when they opened the first door, the first grille door, was done in such a way that your heart missed a beat and it was such a shock. You had been all by yourself with dead silence for hours and hours and hours and suddenly there would be this K-AT-LA, K-A-T-L-A. That alone drove you beserk; that alone was meant to emphasise the fact that ‘we are in control, not only of your being, but your soul as well and we can destroy it’. Solitary confinement is worse than hard labour. When you do hard labour you are with other prisoners, you can tolerate it because you all dig together, you communicate and you are alive. Solitary confinement is meant to kill you alive. It is the most vicious punishment that you could wish on your worst enemy.
You are imprisoned in this little cell. When you stretch your hands you touch the walls. You are reduced to a nobody, a non-value. It is like killing you alive. You are alive because you breathe. You are deprived of everything – your dignity, your everything.
We were held incommunicado. We were not allowed to even see a lawyer. In those days we were completely at their mercy. Some families never knew that their loved ones died after they were detained. We were lucky to be alive and it was purely because of my name that I survived because the easiest thing for them at the time would have been to kill me, which they threatened every day. ‘Oh you’re still alive?’ They would come in every day and say, ‘You’re still alive? We don’t know if you will be alive tomorrow.’
&nb
sp; They honestly believed that it was impossible for a black woman to have this kind of stamina, to be this stubborn. Because they were meant to break us and they could not believe that anyone would resist them like that?
When we were released the first time I had red lips from pellagra and my skin was peeling because even when you tried to eat you brought up because you were very, very hungry. We were supposed to be awaiting-trial prisoners but they did not treat us as such. Our lawyers had to make an application to the Supreme Court for us to be brought food and then when they brought this food if it was bread they would break the bread. They were searching to see if there was anything hidden in it. They would break the fruit open so you got your food in pieces – just to humiliate you and to show that you are a nobody. They reduced you to such levels.
They still searched you in your cell despite the fact that you had nothing other than the clothes you were wearing, two blankets and a mat. We had a plastic bottle with two-and-a-half litres of water for the whole day. That was your ration for the day and you drank from the bottle – there was no glass, you drank from that. Then you wiped your face with that and you just wiped your armpits and yourself. One of our lawyers, George Bizos, had to apply for us to wash. An application had to be brought before the Supreme Court for months to allow us to wash properly.
Solitary confinement was designed to kill you so slowly that you were long dead before you died. By the time you died, you were nobody. You had no soul anymore and a body without a soul is a corpse anyway. It is unbelievable that you survived all that. When I was told that most of my torturers were dead, I was so heartbroken. I wanted them to see the dawn of freedom. I wanted them to see how they lost their battle with all that they did to us, that we survived. We are the survivors who made this history.