THERE is an assumption that when we do not respond to detractors of the force de nature that was Mama Winifred Nomzamo Madikizela-Mandela, we do so because we are incapable of critical thought.
Well, this assumption is wrong.
We have not responded because now is a time to mourn. We have not responded because human decency requires us to reserve this time to write eulogies and not to place argumentative essays on top of her coffin.
Also, we have not responded because we are confident that the cumulative contributions and personal sacrifices that she made towards the liberation of our country and our people are far greater than any mistakes she might have made in the ordinary process of being human.
But I have now made this decision to go down to the Piraeus that Plato speaks of in the opening line of The Republic, meaning I will waive my right to be allowed the space to mourn the loss of Mam’ Winnie.
I will roll up my sleeves and do the hard work of telling the truths that will build bridges to a future better than our past has done. I will do just as Shakespeare’s Mark Antony in Julius Caesar did: while addressing his fellow countrymen, he said that he had “not come to praise Caesar but to bury him”.
Those words are so poignant, so very apt in their description of why I intend not to praise or defend Mam’ Winnie but to ensure she gets a proper send-off by the body politic.
I could never claim to have the right to defend Mam’ Winnie, not even if I wanted to. Who am I to even begin to presume she could ever need me to defend her? She didn’t even need defending against the brutality of the apartheid regime.
Mam’ Winnie definitely doesn’t need any defending now against the fleeting words of armchair critics, which are immediately swallowed up by the darkness of a historical abyss.
So I shall do my bit in recalling the legacy of this great African warrior and hero of our people and nation. The ANC is our glorious movement; it is an organisation that Mam’ Winnie gave all her life to, it is an organisation that I gave all my life to, in service of our people.
The ANC, the oldest liberation movement in Africa, has regrettably still not developed the capacity to deal efficiently and responsibly with allegations of impropriety levelled against any of its members and leaders.
My organisation has not developed any protocols or processes that become activated as soon as there are allegations against its leaders.
The lack of proper organisational capacity to contend with allegations is one of the weaknesses that was exploited by enemy agents when they went on a propaganda campaign against Mam’ Winnie. Because of this lacuna in its processes, my ANC became reactionary when faced with screaming headlines of “Hang Winnie!”
We clumsily chose the easy way out, a path so competently and elaborately laid out before us by intelligence agents of the apartheid regime.
We deserted Mam’ Winnie.
Sections of the United Democratic Front (UDF) became hypnotised by the Stratcom’s repetitive false claim that Winnie was a witch. They did so to the extent that they lost their capacity for critical thinking. If this had not been the case, they would have been able to recognise the glaring inconsistencies in the “Winnie is a witch” narrative.
Had our Mass Democratic Movement (MDM) structures afforded Mam’ Winnie the decency of waiting for her to defend herself against the dirty tricks campaign before shutting her out of MDM structures completely, they would have seen the real culprit.
They would have seen the hand of Stratcom eventually being exposed as the author of the “Winnie is a witch” narrative.
I am the first to admit that she was not an angel but I am equally quick to place on record that she was not a witch.
Our president, Oliver Tambo, knew this timeless truth and that is why he stood by her and gave her his unwavering support. It is because I love my organisation that I feel compelled, on principle, to point out that we cannot allow this vacuum to continue any longer.
The harm that we do to our comrades, to their families and to our movement far surpasses any superficial considerations of political expediency.
It is a stain on the ANC flag, which Mam’ Winnie religiously hoisted outside her house for decades, that our organisation ostracised her and sought to banish her from the collective life of an organisation that meant so much to her and around which her identity was built, an organisation that was the very essence of her being.
What our organisation did to Mam’ Winnie was wrong. It was not fair. She did not deserve the contempt we showed her. It was for us that she kept the candle burning when the winds of apartheid repression were at their worst.
History has began the process of absolving Mam’ Winnie. The recent documentary that revealed so much of the Stratcom’s dirty tricks to smear her name is the snowball that I believe will launch an avalanche of historical corrections around the legacy of Mam’ Winnie.
I was fortunate to have been with her when this documentary premiered. We watched it together and as we watched, I could see that she had carried this pain silently and in a dignified manner for a very long time.
MK and Mam’ Winnie
Her extraordinary resilience, her ability to endure and to persevere always captured the imagination of my comrades in the MK. So great was the reverence with which we held her that comrades would go to great lengths to make contact with Mam’ Winnie.
My fellow MK cadres would risk detection by the security branch in an effort just to communicate with mama.
She was a great inspiration to us in the MK camps; her fearlessness in the face of imminent danger strengthened our resolve to fulfil our mission of liberating the people of our country.
There was a strong bond between her and MK cadres, a bond that remained until her passing, a bond based on the mutual knowledge that each one was willing to pay the ultimate price for the liberation of our country.
Mam’ Winnie and the youth
Mam’ Winnie had a fire in her belly that sent cold shivers down the spines of some, but warmed the hearts of most who recognised her, including the youth of our country.
Throughout the Struggle, Mam’ Winnie always resonated with and was embraced by the youth. Even today, when the youth decry the elder generation as being too cautious and lacking in revolutionary urgency, she was never accused of any such deficiency.
She received many invitations to programmes of young people - the young always embraced her as one of their own - and her home was where many young leaders found food for their revolutionary souls.
We owe Mam’ Winnie a debt we could never possibly repay. We could never give her back the 491 days she spent in solitary confinement. We could never remove the pain and suffering she was viciously subjected to by the brutal apartheid regime. We could never undo the damage that we inflicted upon her as her comrades.
All of these things we can never undo, but as an organisation and as comrades we can give her a dignified send-off.
Then we can spend some time reflecting on how to go about implementing new policies - policies that begin to institutionalise the organisational processes that will ensure that our movement will never again subject another comrade to the treatment that we subjected Mama Winnie to.
Lala Ngoxolo Mama!
* Dlodlo is Minister of Public Service and Administration and a former MK soldier.