Winnie lived life to the fullest and inspired many
The people of SA don’t need Zuma
MAMA Winnie Mandela was finally laid to rest, She has done her deed, living her life to the fullest and inspiring a multitude of South Africans.
The best we can do is to honour her tireless efforts in promoting social and political justice in our land and to continue exposing the injustices that exist and call for a renewed sense of quality for the masses.
Her life was spent in the service of the oppressed and exploited.
During the Struggle, she stood firm. The volcanic potential of the life of this land manifested in her struggle.
Winnie Mandela fought a quiet revolution to secure our liberty. She was our liberator from tyranny. Her impetuousness and daredevilry, the originality of her ideas shook the oppressor.
She believed that to fight for yourself is natural, to fight for others is grand, to fight for the human race is nobler still.
Her name will be remembered as having helped lay the foundation for a nation. She was a legend. She inspired the best in us.
Great leaders have monuments erected in their honour, but this noble woman managed in her lifetime to become enmeshed in millions of hearts.
It’s some consolation that her memory has been preserved, immortalised in a significant day that will always be alive.
She was blessed with prodigious gifts – formidable intellect, eloquence, far-sightedness, energetic audacity, confidence. She filled a room with energy.
The name Winnie Mandela has acquired – for more than one generation – the feel of permanence and awe which time confers on certain historical monuments in the consistence of purpose and the unique kind of dedication which she brought to the public life of the people of South Africa.
In any objective and serious assessment of the social and political history of South Africa, Winnie Mandela, whose name is synonymous with the country’s struggles for political freedom and democracy, can hardly be omitted from those whose creditentials would recommend them as national heroes of the country.
May her departed soul rest in peace.
FAROUK ARAIE Benoni I READ the article by Molifi Tshabalala and wondered why he would think the ANC still needed Jacob Zuma.
Tshabalala, even South Africa does not need Zuma. He has done irreparable damage to the country, which intelligent, broad-minded people will not forgive him for.
It was a huge mistake for the ANC to vote him in as president, especially after he was found to have had a corrupt relationship with Schabir Shaik.
Through some miracle, he was set free while only Shaik was found guilty and imprisoned.
Because of this dishonest and corrupt action, Zuma was fired as deputy president by then-president Thabo Mbeki.
Foolishly, the ANC recalled Mbeki and eventually voted Zuma in as president.
During Zuma’s reign, corruption rose to an obscenely high level in the government sector and the economy plunged to a record low with poverty and unemployment rising to a high.
With Zuma’s allegedly poor and corrupt management in the government, the Guptas managed to worm themselves in, being awarded multimillion-rand government contracts and having a say in the government’s decisionmaking.
Had Zuma been an honest and straight man, we would not have considered the Guptas.
It would seem that Zuma’s only interests were those of his family, his cronies and of course his personal gain.
I was disgusted to see a large number of ANC members marching in support of Zuma when he appeared in court to face 16 counts of corruption, fraud, money laundering, racketeering and tax evasion.
This all has to do with the theft of taxpayers’ money.
In my view, Zuma put his interests and those of the ANC before the people of South Africa. REGGIE CHELLAN
Brookdale