Life story
Mandela, whose second name is Rolihlahla, was born on 18 July 1918 at Mvezo, near Qunu. He was the son of Nonqaphi Nosekeni and Henry Mgadla Mandela, chief councillor to the paramount chief of the Tembu. He spent his early childhood in the Transkei, being groomed to become a chief.
Mandela matriculated at Healdtown Methodist Boarding School and enrolled at Fort Hare University College, where he met Oliver Tambo. It was at Fort Hare that he first became involved in student politics, and he was expelled in 1940 after participating in a student protest.
Mandela left the Transkei, partly to avoid an arranged marriage, and moved to Johannesburg where he was employed as a mine policeman. Shortly after this he met Walter Sisulu, who helped him obtain articles with a legal firm. Completing a BA degree by correspondence in 1941, he then began studying for a law degree, which he didn’t complete. In December 1952, Mandela and Oliver Tambo opened the first African legal
partnership in the country.
Together with Sisulu and Tambo, Mandela participated in the founding of the African National Congress Youth League in 1944. The Youth League invigorated the ANC. Its Programme of Action was adopted by the ANC in 1949, and it provided much of the impetus that led to mass protests and later, the formation of the ANC’s armed wing, Umkhonto weSizwe. In 1948 he served as the Youth League’s national secretary, and in 1950 became its national president. He became one of four deputy presidents of the ANC in October 1952.
In December of the same year, Mandela and 19 others were arrested and charged under the Suppression of Communism Act for their participation in the Defiance Campaign, a national protest against laws curtailing the freedoms of blacks, Indians and coloureds.
The campaign was significant for Mandela.
Whereas previously he was wary of working with non-black Africans, the campaign convinced him to move towards co-ordinating an interracial and united front to fight apartheid.
Mandela was sentenced to nine months’ imprisonment with hard labour, suspended for two years. He was later served with a six-month banning order prohibiting him from attending meetings, or from leaving the Johannesburg magisterial district. For the following nine years his banning orders were continually renewed.
In December 1956 Mandela was one of 156 political activists arrested and charged with high treason for the campaign leading to the adoption of The Freedom Charter in 1955. The trial lasted four-and-a-half years. On 25 March 1961, Mandela and 29 others were found not guilty.
In 1958 he married Nomzamo Winnie Madikizela. They have two daughters, Zenani and Zindzi. It was a turbulent marriage. During Mandela’s imprisonment
on Robben Island, Winnie spearheaded the struggle outside of prison. During the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings some three decades later, she was linked to the deaths of several young ANC activists. They divorced in 1996.
Mandela has a son, Makgatho, and a daughter, Makaziwe, from his first marriage to Evelyn Ntoko, a nurse. Their third child, Thembi, was killed in a car accident while Mandela was in prison.
When the apartheid government banned the ANC and the Pan Africanist Congress in 1960, Mandela led the campaign to launch an underground struggle. He emerged as a leading figure in the formation of Umkhonto weSizwe, the ANC’s armed wing, becoming its first commander-in-chief.
After working outside of South Africa for a period – a time that included military training in Algeria - Mandela returned to South Africa in July 1962. On August 5 the police finally captured the elusive "Black Pimpernel"
near Howick in the then Natal. He was tried and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment for incitement to strike and illegally leaving the country.
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