Mandela by Anthony Sampson

Author:Anthony Sampson [Sampson, Anthony]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-81402-9
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2011-12-21T05:00:00+00:00

*When the Lord Provost of Glasgow wrote a letter, released to the press, to the South African President asking for Mandela to be allowed to come to Scotland to receive his award, the South African Consul in Glasgow reported to Pretoria with pride that “the response (even in Labour newspapers) has been one of neutrality, disapproval, hostility or, now, of disinterest.”26

23

Insurrection

1982–1985

IN APRIL 1982 the commanding officer of Robben Island, Brigadier Munro, came into Mandela’s cell to tell him to pack his belongings because he was being moved from the island. Mandela, puzzled, stowed his accumulated things into a few cardboard boxes, and had no time to say proper good-byes. He was taken with three others—Walter Sisulu, Raymond Mhlaba and Andrew Mlangeni—to board the ferry to Cape Town. From the boat they looked back in the dusk at the island which had been their home for eighteen years. In Cape Town they were rushed past armed guards to a huge truck with a cage on it, into which they were herded. After being kept standing for an hour’s drive, they arrived in the lush suburb of Tokai, full of vineyards and gardens, where they were taken inside Pollsmoor prison, a huge complex built for 6,000 common-law prisoners.1 From the outside, Pollsmoor looked sunny and cheerful. Inside, it was a self-enclosed underworld of dark corridors and clanging metal doors leading to rows of barred cells. They were taken to the top floor, to find a big room with four beds with sheets and towels, and their own separate washroom. From this isolated fortress Mandela would soon watch his country hurtling into much more serious violence, which he was helpless to control.

The prisoners’ treatment at Pollsmoor was much more civilized than it had been on Robben Island. They were given meals of proper meat and vegetables; they were allowed more newspapers and periodicals, including Time and the Guardian Weekly; and there was a long rooftop terrace, where they could relax during the day. They enjoyed new gadgets which they had never seen before, including television, videos and FM radio.2 Mandela even had a separate cell where he could read and write letters.3 Compared to the island, it seemed to him like a five-star hotel. But he felt disoriented and much more isolated. He missed the camaraderie and arguments, and even the wildness, of the island, which was much closer to nature than this concrete compound.

When Winnie came to see him soon after his arrival she found him looking “very, very well.” She was impressed by the handsome prison structure, which resembled a modern technical institution, and by the polite warder James Gregory, who had been with Mandela on the island. She also appreciated the more humane conditions for visits: she and Mandela could see and hear each other properly, through clear glass and loud amplifiers. But she felt he was worse off than before, cut off from his friends and subjected to “harassment of the soul.”4 He complained about the cold, damp cell and the lack of any view: he had not seen a blade of grass, he complained, since he arrived.

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