1918 Born in the Eastern Cape
1943 Joins ANC
1956 Charged with high treason, but
charges dropped after a four-year trial
1962 Jailed for five years for
incitement and leaving country without a passport
1964 Charged with sabotage, sentenced to
life
1990 Freed from prison
1993 Wins Nobel Peace Prize
1994-99 Serves as president
2004 Retires from public life
2010 Last major public appearance at
football World Cup in Johannesburg
BBC | 6 December 2013 Last updated at 11:17
GMT
Nelson
Mandela's ability to use words to breathe life into his cause was one of his
most powerful weapons in the struggle for black equality in South Africa.
Here is a selection of some of his most
compelling quotes.
Conclusion
of his three-hour defence speech at his 1964 trial for sabotage and treason:
"There are times when my heart almost
stops beating, slowed down by heavy loads of longing.
"I would love to bathe once more in the
waters of Umbashe, as I did at the beginning of 1935."
On his
time imprisoned on Robben Island (from Nelson Mandela's autobiography, The Long
Walk to Freedom, 1994):
"I found solitary confinement the most
forbidding aspect of prison life. There is no end and no beginning; there is
only one's own mind, which can begin to play tricks. Was that a dream or did it
really happen? One begins to question everything. Did I make the right
decision, was my sacrifice worth it? In solitary, there is no distraction from
these haunting questions.
"But the human body has an enormous
capacity for adjusting to trying circumstances. I have found that one can bear
the unbearable if one can keep one's spirits strong even when one's body is
being tested. Strong convictions are the secret of surviving deprivation; your
spirit can be full even when your stomach is empty."
Message
read by his daughter Zinzi to a rally in Soweto in 1985:
"In the name of the law, I found myself
treated as a criminal... not because of what I had done, but because of what I
stood for, because of my conscience. No-one in his right senses would choose
such a life, but there comes a time when a man is denied the right to live a
normal life, when he can only live the life of an outlaw because the government
has so decreed to use the law.
"The question being asked up and down
the country is this: Is it politically correct to continue preaching peace and
non-violence when dealing with a government whose barbaric practices have
brought so much suffering and misery to Africans? I cannot and will not give
any undertaking at a time when I, and you, the people, are not free. Your
freedom and mine cannot be separated. I will return."
Describing
the day of his release from prison in 1990 (The Long Walk to Freedom, 1994):
"The cameras started clicking like a
great herd of metallic beasts. I raised my right fist and there was a roar. I
had not been able to do that for 27 years and it gave me a surge of strength
and joy."
On
fatherhood (The Long Walk to Freedom, 1994):
"Perhaps I was blinded to certain things
because of the pain I felt for not being able to fulfil my role as husband to
my wife and father to my children.
"It seems the destiny of freedom
fighters to have unstable personal lives... to be the father of a nation is a
great honour, but to be the father of a family is a greater joy. But it was a
job I had far too little of."
On
prison (The Long Walk to Freedom, 1994):
"A man who takes away another man's
freedom is a prisoner of hatred, he is locked behind bars of prejudice and
narrow-mindedness... The oppressed and the oppressor alike are robbed of their
humanity."
On
reconciliation (on acceptance of the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize, shared with then
President FW de Klerk):
"The value of our shared reward will and
must be measured by the joyful peace which will triumph, because the common
humanity that bonds both black and white into one human race will have said to
each one of us that we shall all live like the children of paradise...
"But there are still some within our
country who wrongly believe they can make a contribution to the cause of
justice and peace by clinging to the shibboleths [dogmas] that have been proved
to spell nothing but disaster.
"It remains our hope that these, too,
will be blessed with sufficient reason to realise that history will not be
denied and that the new society cannot be created by reproducing the repugnant
past, however refined or enticingly repackaged."
Presidential
inauguration speech, 10 May 1994:
"We enter into a covenant that we shall
build a society in which all South Africans, both black and white, will be able
to walk tall without any fear in their hearts, assured of the inalienable right
to human dignity, a rainbow nation at peace with itself and the world."
"Never, never, and never again shall it
be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by
another... The sun shall never set on so glorious a human achievement. Let
freedom reign. God bless Africa!"
Address
to international Aids conference, Durban, July 2000:
"In the face of the grave threat posed
by HIV/Aids, we have to rise above our differences and combine our efforts to
save our people. History will judge us harshly if we fail to do so now, and
right now.
"Let us not equivocate: A tragedy of
unprecedented proportions is unfolding in Africa. Aids today in Africa is
claiming more lives than the sum total of all wars, famines and floods, and the
ravages of such deadly diseases as malaria. It is devastating families and
communities; overwhelming and depleting health care services; and robbing
schools of both students and teachers...
"Aids is clearly a disaster, effectively
wiping out the development gains of the past decades and sabotaging the
future... Something must be done as a matter of the greatest urgency."
Message
to the Live 8 concert in Edinburgh, July 2005:
"Massive poverty and obscene inequality
are such terrible scourges of our times... So much of our common future will
depend on the actions and plans of these leaders. They have a historical
opportunity to open the door to hope and the possibility of a better future for
all...
"Sometimes it falls upon a generation to
be great. You be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom. Of course
the task will not be easy. But not to do this would be a crime against
humanity, against which I ask all humanity now to rise up."
A rare
public rebuke for Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, speaking at a dinner in
London to mark his 90th birthday:
"We watch with sadness the continuing
tragedy in Darfur. Nearer to home we have seen the outbreak of violence against
fellow Africans in our own country and the tragic failure of leadership in our
neighbouring Zimbabwe."
At the
opening of the 2010 World Cup:
"The people of Africa learnt the lessons
of patience and endurance in their long struggle for freedom. May the rewards
brought by the Fifa World Cup prove that the long wait for its arrival on
African soil has been worth it. Ke nako [It is time]."
On his
public image (from Mandela's second autobiography, Conversations With Myself,
2010):
"One issue that deeply worried me in
prison was the false image I unwittingly projected to the outside world; of
being regarded as a saint.
"I never was one, even on the basis of
an earthly definition of a saint as a sinner who keeps trying."
CNN | Added on December 5, 2013
The late South African President reflects on his imprisonment and his fight against apartheid.
＃＃＃The late South African President reflects on his imprisonment and his fight against apartheid.
