"My father was a symbol of authority, both because of his role in the family as a father and the fact that he was our school principal. When my father walked into the room where we were, we stood up until he left the room. We never sat on his lap, we never played with him, we never really enjoyed the warmth of a family relationship."
Winnie Mandela had a very strict upbringing, her parents were both teachers and her father was the head at the mission school. The sixth of eleven children, Winnie had a reputation in the family for being the most wilful and difficult. She qualified as a social worker and within two years had met and married Nelson Mandela, a forty year old attorney who was also an activist with the ANC* - the African National Congress(link to glossary). At that time, South Africans were living under apartheid*. Winnie said that at first she was in awe of Nelson Mandela, having heard so much about him and his activities. They had only four years together before he was sentenced to life imprisonment on conspiracy charges.
"My father was a symbol of authority, both because of his role in the family as a father and the fact that he was our school principal. When my father walked into the room where we were, we stood up until he left the room. We never sat on his lap, we never played with him, we never really enjoyed the warmth of a family relationship."
Winnie Mandela had a very strict upbringing, her parents were both teachers and her father was the head at the mission school. The sixth of eleven children, Winnie had a reputation in the family for being the most wilful and difficult. She qualified as a social worker and within two years had met and married Nelson Mandela, a forty year old attorney who was also an activist with the ANC* - the African National Congress(link to glossary). At that time, South Africans were living under apartheid*. Winnie said that at first she was in awe of Nelson Mandela, having heard so much about him and his activities. They had only four years together before he was sentenced to life imprisonment on conspiracy charges.
Once Nelson Mandela was in prison, Winnie felt that she must take up the fight to try to end apartheid in South Africa. At the age of 26 she was left alone with her two daughters aged only 4 and 5. The security forces recognised the possible significance of her role and placed her under constant observation. She also complained of police harassment - they carried out searches of her home. She found it difficult to explain what was happening to her children.
"It was a day to day kind of existence. We were harassed from the moment their father was out of the picture. The government tried to break one in a number of ways and it was extremely difficult to explain to very young children why it was so. It was extremely difficult to explain… the presence of the security forces in their home, why we were being raided, why I would be searched, why I would be followed if I was not a criminal. It was very difficult to explain that one had committed political crimes in the eyes of the state."
Despite the police presence, Winnie Mandela continued to work secretly against the government. She was twice detained under the Terrorism Act and held in solitary confinement. She says that she was tortured. In 1977 she was banished to Brandfort a small town where the locals did not even speak her language. She was still able to speak to foreign reporters and was constantly in the news.
Visiting her husband in prison was a difficult task. Her daughters were not able to visit until they reached the age of sixteen when they were allowed the first "contact" visits. In 1986 Winnie described how hard she found these moments:
"Taking them at that age to their father, their father of that stature was so traumatic. It was one of the most painful moments actually. And I could see the strain on my children both before the visit and for quite some time after. It was only about 18 months ago that they were able to touch him, to hug him and kiss him and they are women already..."
In 1985 she returned to Soweto to continue the struggle in defiance of the security forces. But she found herself in the centre of controversy within the ANC when in 1986 she apparently made a statement at a township rally encouraging the necklacing (this is where a petrol-soaked tyre is placed around a victim's neck and set alight)of those who supported or collaborated with apartheid. Throughout the late 1980s, Winnie Mandela continued to be a controversial figure. In 1989 the body of a murdered boy - Stompie Moeketsi - was discovered at her home and allegations were made against her including murder, assault and abduction. In 1990 Nelson Mandela was finally released from prison. He held fast to his belief in Winnie's innocence saying that she had been framed. At her 1991 trial, she received a suspended sentence for kidnapping.
Interviewed in 1986, she described the effect that years of harassment, solitary confinement and separation from her husband had had upon her. It didn't just make her tough - she uses the word "brutalised".
"All I know is I am terribly brutalised inside. I know my soul is scarred, I know I am bleeding inside all the time. I know the pain of my people's suffering, the pain of having a husband behind bars for 25 years, the pain of bringing up children under the atmosphere I brought them up, is so great inside… But what has happened is that hasn't brutalised me to an extent of being consumed in hate."
Despite the allegations of fraud and murder
against her, many people continued to support her. She remained a voice for
those at the grassroots and listened to people. During the May 1994 elections
(when Nelson Mandela was elected President) Winnie was an outspoken critic of
the ANC and of Nelson Mandela for not transforming the country quickly enough.
She was given the post of Deputy Minister for Arts, Culture, Science and Technology
in the new government but was sacked less than a year later for ignoring party
discipline and for continued criticism of government. At the time Nelson Mandela
said that he hoped the act of being sacked would help her to review and seek
to improve her conduct. In 1996 Nelson and Winnie Mandela were divorced following
four years of separation. In 1997 Winnie Madikizela Mandela (as she now liked
to be known) had to appear before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC.
The TRC aimed to uncover the truth about human rights abuses under apartheid
and to promote reconciliation through hearing the testimony of those who suffered
and the confessions of torturers and terrorists. It concluded that she was
aware of and in some cases probably took part in murders, abductions and assaults
by the Mandela United Football Club - as her bodyguards of the time were known.
Haleh Afshar, Professor of Politics and Women's Studies at York University, summarises Winnie's achievements and acknowledges her shortcomings:
"Winnie Mandela is another example of woman in resistance [in] impossible situations because she represented her husband when he was unable to speak… and she stood for him, and she always spoke as if she were his voice. What is interesting, and what we saw once he came out, is that very often she was her own voice but she represented him because it was easier to represent a male voice in a male world. She too always stayed in touch with the grassroots, she was always and she remains her people's person...Winnie Mandela has suffered from her own vision of herself. She fought hard for many years, in impossible positions, and defended a cause that she believed in. But of course she then made mistakes and she is very unwilling to realise that she is not only an icon she is a person but she expects everyone to put her on a pedestal. Seeing her recently admitting to her mistakes shows that she has … learned you can't be an icon."
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