He visited the Clarkebury Training College and later worked towards his A-levels at the Methodist-run high school of Healdtown. It was shortly after this that he attended the Fort Hare College in Alice in the eastern Cape province, where, as a student leader, he was expelled for organizing a boycott of lectures. In 1940 he went to Johannesburg, where he finished college on correspondence courses and began to study law. He joined the ANC in 1944.

[Back to top of page]

Under the leadership of Anton Lembede, the ANC's Youth League became both a rallying point and focal point of objections about the traditional nature and the political content of the policies being followed by the national movement. Other members of the Youth League included William Nkomo, Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo and Ashby Mda. The Youth League's stated aim was to turn the ANC in to a mass movement, representing labourers, farmers and office workers.

Mandela quickly impressed his fellow members and his diligent work and untiring efforts were rewarded with him being elected Secretary of the Youth League in 1947. Through conscientious work, its campaigning at grassroots levels and its mouthpiece Inyaniso (truth), the Youth League was also able to promote its cause amongst the ANC's top leadership.

The National Party's 1948 election victory, carried off on the foundations of the apartheid system, led the ANC to develop an action program. Getting its inspiration from the Youth League and becoming adopted as the official ANC line, this program firmly supported the use of boycotts, strikes, civil disobedience and non-cooperation.

[Back to top of page]

This action program was developed by David Bopape, Ashby Mda, Nelson Mandela, James Njongwe, Walter Sisulu and Oliver Tambo. To implement the program, older leaders were replaced by their younger counterparts and Walter Sisulu was appointed General Secretary. The conservative Dr. A.B. Xuma lost the presidency of the party to Dr. J.S. Moroka, who was regarded as more militant.

The Youth League followed a program aimed at gaining full citizenship and direct parliamentary representation for all South Africans. Particular attention was paid to land distribution, the right to trade unions, education and culture. Compulsory education was to be introduced for all children and mass education programs for all adults.

The ANC decided upon the timetable for its campaign aimed at nonobservance of apartheid laws, at the end of 1951. The campaign's official start was set at 26 June 1952. The ANC called for mass protests to take place on 6 April 1952 against celebrations marking the 300th anniversary of the arrival of the first Europeans at the Cape. Mandela visited communities across the entire country in his efforts to organize resistance. He would later be tried and sentenced to nine months imprisonment and mandatory labor for his part in the demonstrations. He was also barred from attending any more public events for six months and his residency permit restricted to Johannesburg.

[Back to top of page]

During this time he completed his studies and became an authorized lawyer. He began practicing law in an office in Johannesburg with his friend Oliver Tambo. Recognizing his work during the defiance campaign, he was appointed president of the Youth League and of the ANC in the Transvaal region, and at the end of 1952 he became the ANC's acting president.

Oliver Tambo wrote the following about his experiences of their law practice shortly before his death in 1993:

"To reach our desks each morning Nelson and I ran the gauntlet of patient queues of people overflowing from the chairs in the waiting room into the corridors (...). To be landless (in South Africa) can be a crime, and weekly we interviewed the delegations of peasants who came to tell us how many generations their families had worked a little piece of land from which they were now being ejected (...). To live in the wrong area can be a crime (...). Our buff office files carried thousands of these stories and if, when we started our law partnership, we had not been rebels against apartheid, our experiences in our offices would have remedied the deficiency. We had risen to professional status in our community, but every case in court, every visit to the prisons to interview clients, reminded us of the humiliation and suffering burning into our people."

[Back to top of page]

The government tried to dispute Mandela's status as a lawyer, based on his criminal record. The high court's verdict, however, was that Mandela had only been serving the interests of his fellow blacks and had done nothing which could warrant taking away his license to practice law.

Mandela turned to concentrating his political efforts on developing a plan, which the ANC, faced with intensification of camp conditions, should move to secure. The plan was named "M-Plan" after Mandela. During the 50s, he played a major role in the resistance movement against the Bantu education system and in the popularization of the Freedom Charter. In the late 50s he turned his attention towards the fight against exploitation of workers, passport laws and the segregation of "public" universities. He recognized at an early stage that the Bantu policy represented nothing more than a political swindle and was economically absurd. He also realized quickly that a period of mass evictions, political persecution and police terror would follow.

Mandela was a victim of differing forms of suppression throughout the 50s. He was arrested and imprisoned. Following the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960, the ANC was banned and Mandela, charged with high treason, was imprisoned. Mandela and around 150 others were accused of planning to overthrow violently the South African State as part of a conspiracy sponsored by international communism. This was a capital crime. The high treason process collapsed in 1961 during South Africa's movement towards becoming a republic and all the accused were released on bail.

[Back to top of page]

Now outlawed, the ANC was forced underground. 1400 delegates gathered together in March 1961 under the leadership of the ANC for the All-In African Conference. In a captivating speech, Mandela demanded that the apartheid regime form a national assembly, which would represent all South Africans, and the establishment of a constitution based on democratic principles. He warned the government that if these demands were not met, the celebrations to mark South Africa becoming a republic would be greeted with mass strikes by the majority of its people (black South Africans).

Mandela disappeared underground to organize the campaign. Although he didn't manage to mobilize as many people as he had hoped, he found substantial support throughout the country. The government responded with the largest military mobilization since the war, and South Africa descended into a state of fear and terror.

Mandela was forced to live apart from his family and moved constantly to avoid being discovered by the all-pervasive state informants and spies. Sometimes he disguised himself as a labourer, sometimes as a chauffeur. It was during this time that, together with other ANC leaders, he founded the ANC's armed wing, the Umkhonto we Sizwe, which was to prepare for active deployment. Mandela explained during a later process:

[Back to top of page]

Umkhonto we Sizwe was formed in 1961. Mandela left the country illegally in 1962 and traveled for several months. He approached the Pan African Freedom Movement of East and Central Africa in Ethiopia and was also warmly welcomed in other countries. Feeling instinctively that events would inevitably turn violent, he arranged guerrilla training for the members of Umkhonto we Sizwe while n his journey.

Mandela was arrested shortly after his return to South Africa. He was charged with: Invoking an illegal strike and leaving South Africa without a valid passport

His main intent during his trail was to prove that the charges were not being made against him, but against the African people. Right from the outset, Mandela contested the court's legitimacy to reach a verdict in his case; he viewed himself neither lawfully nor morally bound to abide by laws passed by a parliament in which he was not represented. During a political process, a wide range of interests from different segments of the population collide and the courts were unable to be impartial and fair. By way of introduction, Mandela said:

"I detest racism, because I regard it as a barbaric thing, whether it comes from a black man or a white man."

[Back to top of page]

Mandela was sentenced to a five-year prison term. It was while he was serving this sentence that he was accused of sabotage in the Rivonia process. Mandela's statements during the ensuing court trial went down in the annals of the resistance movement against apartheid and provided inspiration for all those opposed to apartheid. His entire speech is available on our document pages. His closing words were as follows

"I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die."

Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment. He served the first part of his term in the Robben Island jail, a high-security facility located on a small offshore island, seven kilometers from Cape Town. He was moved to Pollsmoor prison in Cape Town in April 1984 and again to Victor Verster prison near to Paarl in December 1988, from where he was eventually released. While serving his sentence he refused offers of early release. These offers came with strings attached; for his freedom he was required to recognize the Transkei and issue a statement that he would move there. This, however, would have represented recognition of the government's Bantu policy and was something Mandela could never subscribe to. His answer to these offers was to emphasize that prisoners cannot sign agreements. Only free people can negotiate

[Back to top of page]

Released on 11 February 1990, Mandela began work immediately on achieving his life's goal. In 1991, at the ANC's first annual general meeting since regaining legal status in 1990, Mandela was appointed president.

Nelson Mandela had remained steadfastly true to his beliefs about democracy and equality. Despite provocation, he had never turned to racism to fight racism. His life is an inspiration for the suppressed and those subjected to discrimination in South Africa and the rest of the world, and for all those fighting against suppression and

Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993, Nelson Mandela emerged from the first general elections in 1994 as South Africa's first president. He retired from political life in 1999 and now lives in his place of birth in Transkei.

[Back to top of page]

[Additional materials: Documents, inc. Mandela's Rivonia speech, organization of resistance, defeat of apartheid, South Africa today]

[Back to top of page]

Subjects:  Human Rights  I  Democracy  I  Parties  I  Examples  I  Europe  I  Globalisation  I  United Nations  I  Sustainability

Methods:    Teaching Politics    II    Peace Education    II    Methods