On 5 August 1962, he was driving through the Natal countryside dressed in a chauffeur’s uniform when he was arrested at Howick. His life on the run had ended
On 20 April 1964, from the dock of the defendant, Nelson Mandela talked for three hours. It was a speech reviewed by two of his friends—the renowned authors Anthony Sampson and Nadine Gordimer.
“… I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all people will live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal for which I hope to live for and to see realised. But, My Lord, if it needs to be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.”
On 12 July 1964 Mandela was flown to Robben Island where the guards gleefully informed him: “This is where you’ll die.” He was to remain there for the next 18 years, in a ten-foot by six-foot cell, with three blankets and a straw mat.
In 1982, Nelson Mandela was moved from Robben Island to the Pollsmoor Prison near Cape Town.
In 1986, he was visited in the prison by former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser. Mandela’s first question was, “Tell me Mr Fraser, is Don Bradman still alive?”
When Mandela was released from prison in 1990, Fraser presented him with an autographed bat. The inscription read: “To Nelson Mandela in recognition of a great unfinished innings—Don Bradman.”
On 11 February 1990, Nelson Mandela was released from the Victor Verster prison. He had been relocated to a cottage at this prison outside Cape Town in December 1988, a few months after his 70th birthday had been celebrated worldwide.
The alliance he formed with the then President FW de Klerk metamorphosed South Africa at an unexpected rate.
In August 1991 Ali Bacher had brought Clive Lloyd to South Africa. The idea was to inspire the black kids, to tell them his story, to talk about what he had achieved as a Black cricketer.
Lloyd wanted to meet Mandela. Bacher got on the phone with Steve Tshwete, senior member of ANC and later Minister of Sports in Mandela’s government.
The arrangements were made. The very next day Lloyd and Bacher were sitting with Mandela.
South Africa had been readmitted into international cricket, but there had been no move by ICC to include them in the World Cup. When Lloyd and Bacher met Mandela, there were a lot of journalists present. One of them asked Mandela his views about South Africa playing in the World Cup.
Mandela’s answer was spontaneous: “Of course, we must play.”
That was it. The message had been passed on to the world of cricket. Things were set in motion. South Africa, led by Kepler Wessels, soon left for Australia to paticipate in the World Cup.
During the first ever Indian tour to South Africa in 1992-93, most of the Indian contingent travelling with passports that still bore the legend: “Valid for travel to all countries except the Republic of South Africa”.
In Johannesburg, they were invited for an audience with 74-year-old Mandela.
When Mandela met Amrit Mathur, the Indian administrative manager, the great man said, “I recognised you from television.” Mathur was left blushing.
In 1993 Mandela became the joint winner of the Nobel Peace Prize alongside de Klerk.
In 1994 South Africa held its first ever election in which all races participated with universal adult suffrage. Conducted under the direction of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), it marked the culminationof the four-year process that ended apartheid. ANC won in a landslide and Mandela was elected President.
It had been a long, long walk to freedom. Nelson Mandela still enjoyed his cricket. In his youth he had watched visiting sides from the enclosures in the ground reserved for the non-Europeans. Now he enjoyed greeting the visiting cricket teams.
Of course, the 1995 Rugby World Cup, the Invictus Cup, showed exactly what he was trying to do with sports as a means to unify the country.
In 1994, the year Mandela became President, the Australian cricket team visited South Africa for the first time after isolation. As already mentioned, Mandela welcomed the visitors with warmth and enthusiasm, recalling his experience of watching Neil Harvey bat in the segregated days. The memories of watching cricket from the Cage.
It was from the same Cage that Basil D’Oliveira had watched Neil Harvey bat during the 1949-50 tour. There was no formal instruction or coaching available to the non-white cricketers. Hence D’Oliveira and his mates watched the matches from the Cage to ‘steal with the eyes’.
In 1996 Mandela met D’Oliveira. It was during the home series against England. Both men stood in their whites and Proteas cricket blazer.
In 1997 Mandela met the Indian team at Newlands, Cape Town on the third morning. Sachin Tendulkar and Mohammad Azharuddin put up an extraordinary display of batsmanship on that day, adding 222 in 40 overs after coming together at 58 for 5.
During the 1999 World Cup in England, South Africa played Pakistan in the Super Six. Lance Klusener won it from a very tight corner with a 41-ball 46.
In Johannesburg, Ali Bacher got a call from Mandela’s personal assistant. The President wanted to call Klusener and congratulate him. Bacher told the PA that Klusener spoke fluent Zulu.
Mandela called Klusener and congratulated him in Zulu.
Just before the start of the 2003 World Cup, Mandela met the South African team led by Shaun Pollock. He had a special word for every player. He knew all of them.
After he had been introduced to everyone, Mandela came back to Makhaya Ntini. He took him aside.
“You must go back to your village and tell the young people that you are a star,” he said.
Ntini was not yet a regular in the team. He did not think he was a star. But Mandela reassured him. “You represent many millions of people, and it is important they know what you have done.”
Later Ntini said, “Every time I wasn’t performing at my best after that, I would think of what Tata Madiba had said. Most of the time, I was the only Black man in the side, and he made me feel proud of that. He made me aware of my responsibility—that’s why he told me to go back to the village and tell people that everything was possible, that they could make their dreams come true.
It was Mandela’s words that made Ntini carry the shield of his people as he stood next to Pollock at the World Cup opening ceremony. “It was an important symbol. Madiba said I should carry the shield for as long as I could.”
In 2005, Brian Lara had a special audience with Mandela. Not one to show either nerves on the cricket field or veneration to famous names, Lara donned a black suit, shaved meticulously and was visibly nervous when he arrived for the meeting.
While Basil D’Oliveira was in South Africa on one of his final coaching trips to South Africa he received a call from Mandela. It was an invitation to lunch.
The two old men, who had played their magnificent roles in levelling the playing fields, talked while they ate. At the end of the meal, Mandela rose from his chair, hugged D’Oliveira and said, “Thanks for coming, Basil. You must go home now. You’ve done your bit. Tell your family to look after you. They must look after you now.”
Nelson Mandela was born on 18 July 1918.