At some stage President Zuma is going to allow Mandela's family to pull the plug on the fella (he's teetering on the edge of death if he hasn't actually pegged it by the time I post this) and that will be the signal for global mourning, hours of TV news articles taking over all schedules (on every channel, so no escape), forcible wearing of black arm bands by everyone in the western world, pseudo-'sincere' messages from everyone from Tony Blair to Ginger Spice and any other sort of 'recognised grieving signals' that Guardian readers and Daily Mail readers can think of....


I've a sneaky feeling that anyone caught not taking part will be branded a racist.... and I don't like that thought. Why do we have to care or pretend to be interested?


Thing is, it was something that someone was chatting about at a party over the weekend. Normal small talk rubbish, but when this subject came up suddenly it got all serious. I said I couldn't care less about Mandela and that sort of kicked things off........ Drink was involved so it didn't take much for one of the wives to jump onto a soap box and spout some pretend politics, and then she needed backing up by hubby, and anyone that put an alternative view in about the state of South African politics was branded a racist Boer bore....


If he pegs it (and he will) would you be happy if the Council (and Buck' House) flew their flags at half mast? (I said no, but THAT response did not get me any points at the party and I ended up getting grabbed by the scruff of the neck by Mrs Spartacus and we toddled off home....)

Hope we get invited back for the Mandela Street Party.....

I don't think it's racist if you don't care about what Mandella has done for this world.
It's ignorant yes, racist no.

Just like Ross Kemp on Gangs.. on the impressions show.
"I could see things were about to kick off, so I got out of there."

Oh dear Spartacus, we are all entitled to our own view but I do feel saddened by your feelings (or lack of them ) on this matter.
I agree, this is ignorance rather than racism. It would be good if you could at least show a little respect for Mr Mandala, his friends & family at this difficult time for them all.

Sometimes it is worth considering if what one is about to say will improve upon the silence.

Though freedom of speech is something Mandela himself would approve of.....

Being free to say what one thinks about things doesn't make someone immune from being rude. Just because we are free to think what we like, we have to accept that there are consequences to letting other people know what those thoughts are.

By many accounts, Nelson Mandela was a nasty piece of work as a young man. But, following release from his long incarceration he did a lot of good. He brought hope and some reconciliation to a very troubled part of the world - and for that he will be remembered in positive terms by many.

It is his first wife, Winnie, who I think deserves to be judged harshly.

I don't care that much, he did a lot of good, but he also did a lot of bad, including murder I believe. I'm with you, there's nothing wrong with your views, I think the people at the party sound more ignorant for not accepting that there are more than one train of thought on the subject. It will be a sad day for a lot of people, but I wouldn't see a reason to fly the state flag here at half mast.

A lot of people also cannot differentiate being honest with being rude.

Winnie was his second wife. Just to be irritatingly pedantic

He will be more deserving of an outpouring than Diana. Now that was vomit inducing.

You're entitled to hold an opinion. That doesn't automatically mean it's one that's entitled to respect though.

What's going to be really nauseating is watching Cameron stand up and hail Mandela as some kind of Statesman.

In 1985 Cameron was a leading light in the Federation of Conservative Students who produced the infamous "Hang Nelson Mandela" posters. Then, in 1989 when he worked in the Tory Policy Unit at Conservative Central Office he went on an anti-sanctions 'fact finding' mission to South Africa with a pro apartheid Lobby firm which was then found to be sponsored by Botha himself.

Lets see how two-faced Cameron can be when Mandela finally shuffles off.

I heard on the news his condition has improved although he is still in what they call a serious state.

Indeed. South Africa is not to be sniffed at, and definitely not laughed at

Why?

Totally different people, no comparison.

One last big blast of morphine I would imagine! That's how some of my family members have spent there last days in the 'Rainbow Rooms' anyway, RIP.

Well I got it, if no one else did.

So did I, but let's say I didn't need a corset to stop my sides from splitting!

At least South Africa devolved into a reasonable place to live even though the crime rate is out of control. The opposite side of the coin is the way Zimbabwe has, through corrupt government, crippled itself since becoming independent.

I'm not fully sure that you have much idea about South African politics at the time of the end of apartheid. PW "Botha himself" was, along with FW de Klerk the architect of the end of apartheid. He started the end of Afrikaans rule (note that this isn't the same a white rule as many of the whites were as disenfranchised as the the rest of the non white community). South Africa was a very violent splintered set of societies and Cameron in all likelihood learnt more from this visit than anyone sitting in the UK and maybe this had a different set of results than those publicly displayed. PW Botha was in a situation where he knew that his government's time was limited and had to balance the Afrikaans military and the end of apartheid. This was a very difficult position and once he left, FW de Klerk continued and concluded his initial movement.
I lived through this time in South Africa and only learned what was happening behind the scenes in the last 10 or so years. What I saw and what I now know still astounds me. People of different races and colour I thought were staunch racists turned out to be the opposite. The state machinery was run by a few politicians (mainly military) that were more interested in control than colour. Much of this in my view was caused by a solid Afrikaans nationalism started and further enhanced by British rule and mistakes.
Mandela, in my view, is one of the greatest statesmen in history and Cameron is right in saying this. In Mandela's (and many other South Africans) situation, I would have wanted retribution rather than reconciliation. He is an outstanding example of showing support and understanding of everyone around him, including those than wanted to harm him.
As for Cameron being two faced, I think that what he understood at the time and what he knows now are two different things. Two faced in my view is different from learning from mistakes. Maybe he has a different opinion now that the situation is different.

Thanks for that helpful post.

You mean the Botha who had been a member of the Ossewabrandwag and refused to testify at the Government's Truth and Reconciliation Commission for exposing apartheid-era crimes. They, the TRC, found that he had ordered the bombing of the South African Council of Churches headquarters in Johannesburg. In August 1998 he was fined and given a suspended jail sentence for his refusal to testify in relation to human rights violations and the violence sanctioned by the State Security Council (SSC) which he, as president until 1989, had directed. That one?

As I said before the situation in South Africa was very confused with many different objectives from different groups. People were doing things that would be considered unacceptable in present society including the current administration (who were responsible for many acts of violence). Even raising these points, Botha started the dismantling of apartheid and we should recognise this. He obviously had many things that he probably isn't proud of but loyalties can cause apparently odd decisions.
I don't excuse anyone who did things like this. What still amazes me in South Africa is that these acts of violence have been put in perspective and whilst not forgotten are now in the past. I suspect that many reading this could learn from it.

You forgot to mention that the TRC subsequently overturned the charge. Its also interesting that his wife was offered a state funeral when he died in 2006. His wife turned this down.

A final reply to put this in perspective. The Boer republics (Transvaal or South African Republic, Orange Free State and a host of others) were created by the descendants of Dutch settlers who wanted independence from Britain. Not all of the were white - Griqualand East and West were created and inhabited by coloured populations. Various issues lead to Britain either annexing them or going to war to claim them. Britain has the dubious claim to have created concentration camps for the civilian population during the Boer wars and the destruction of farms and residences to stop Boer forces having bases created immense hatred for the British. This had tensions that went right through to independence and the creation of the Republic of South Africa (which included the Transvaal and OFS) in the 1960s.
Taking this into account, is it surprising that PW Botha was a member of the Ossewabrandwag? The fact that this was disbanded in 1948 rather takes away the implications of the post.
Its easy to criticise without knowledge of the circumstances and even easier to take things in isolation and create apparently sensational headlines. South Africa in the 1980s was a complicated place.

The fact that it was disbanded in 1948 means he stopped holding those views did it? I'd have thought it just meant that as they'd lost the war they decided it was 'low profile time'.

As to it being a complicated place, those 'Hang Nelson Mandela' posters printed by Cameron and his cronies seem pretty un-complicated.

He probably did hold those views to an extent, unsurprising in view of the way the British acted in the South African wars and later in dealing with the republics - something that was his Afrikaans heritage. This organisation had a pro Nazi anti British stance and was too extreme for the general Afrikaans population. The Union government interred many of the members during the second world war and the sentiment changed enough after the war to disband it.
The point I was making and have made several times is that whatever his views he started the destruction of apartheid and helped in the creation of South Africa as it is today. The reference to "Botha himself" implies something quite different.


I was referring to South Africa and this reference is to Britain. Again the point I made previously is that its easy to make uninformed judgements and this poster is a good example of that.

That there were such extreme views makes SA's relatively peaceful transition from white minority rule all the more remarkable, and it would appear that Mandela played a central role in promoting peace. Glib perhaps to characterize a complicated social change in one single event, but Mandela at the Rugby World Cup wearing the Springbok over his heart and handing Francois Pienaar the cup is a powerful image, and all the more powerful if you understand the cultural significance of rugby union in SA. Kind of like Gerry Adams in an orange suit going to mass with Ian Paisley.