Tonight we weep for the passing of a good man.
He was not a hero. He was a man doing his best. Heroes choose to be so; I don't think for him there was choice. The work had to be done. So he did it. His country was in pain, so he healed it.
No other nation managed to change as South Africa did - without bloodshed.
Even Gandhi -the great Mahatma - did not free India without massacres and horrors; retaliations and revenge. Yet Madiba took a rag-tag group of warring rival tribes of all colours and shamed us into brotherhood. He stood in front of the revenge seekers and said: "Have you suffered more than I?"
He stood before the oppressors and said: "I will not be so", and stretched out his hand.
Sounds ever so mystical, doesn't it? It sounds like the lies historians write after great men die. But for once, there is no lie. A good man died.
Tonight not one South African of any tribe can say his Father did not die.
The magical prism that transmuted the hard light of bitter judgement into a rainbow nation is gone.
The miracle, hopefully, will live on.
Pass in peace Madiba.
He was not a hero. He was a man doing his best. Heroes choose to be so; I don't think for him there was choice. The work had to be done. So he did it. His country was in pain, so he healed it.
No other nation managed to change as South Africa did - without bloodshed.
Even Gandhi -the great Mahatma - did not free India without massacres and horrors; retaliations and revenge. Yet Madiba took a rag-tag group of warring rival tribes of all colours and shamed us into brotherhood. He stood in front of the revenge seekers and said: "Have you suffered more than I?"
He stood before the oppressors and said: "I will not be so", and stretched out his hand.
Sounds ever so mystical, doesn't it? It sounds like the lies historians write after great men die. But for once, there is no lie. A good man died.
Tonight not one South African of any tribe can say his Father did not die.
The magical prism that transmuted the hard light of bitter judgement into a rainbow nation is gone.
The miracle, hopefully, will live on.
Pass in peace Madiba.
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