Nelson Mandela: Inaugural Address

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

Mandela's inaugural address was highly symbolic. The very fact that he, a black man and former prisoner of the apartheid regime, was delivering it before a large crowd in which there were representatives of most of the countries in the world, demonstrated that South Africa had rejoined the world community after a long period of isolation under apartheid. Mandela speaks of humanity having “taken [South Africa] back into its bosom” and remarks, “We, who were outlaws not so long ago, have today been given the rare privilege to be host to the nations of the world on our own soil.” Mandela was acknowledging that apartheid South Africa had long been isolated and treated as a pariah nation because of its racial policies, and he was celebrating that now South Africa had become a model for others to follow, a land in which it seemed that racial reconciliation had triumphed. And so Mandela thanks the guests from all over the world for attending and hopes that they would “continue to stand by us as we tackle the challenges of building peace, prosperity, non-sexism, non-racialism and democracy.” He was very conscious of the fact that South Africa was emerging from decades of conflict, isolation, and economic decline, and he knew that it would need much help from others if it was to overcome the challenges it faced.

In the first sentence of his address Mandela speaks of newborn liberty, referring to the fact that South Africa was experiencing a new dawn of democracy after the long night of apartheid. His references to “an extraordinary human disaster that lasted too long” and to South Africa tearing “itself apart in a terrible conflict” point to apartheid and to the struggle against it, in which many had died and millions had suffered. For although far fewer people died in the South African conflict between 1948 and 1994 than in other conflicts on the African continent, such as in neighboring Zimbabwe in the 1970s or in the war for independence in Algeria in the 1950s and early 1960s, the policy of apartheid had trampled on the dignity of black people.

In speaking of apartheid in this way, Mandela addressed not only the black majority who had suffered under it but also those whites who had supported apartheid until recently and who had served the apartheid state. Of course, he was speaking as well to the whites who had opposed apartheid. Mandela's general attitude of reconciliation ensured that he did not arouse antagonism among those who had supported the old apartheid order. Although Mandela continued to fear a far-right backlash against his new government from Afrikaners who were not reconciled to the new order, no serious resistance occurred. This was in large part due to Mandela's personality and policies of reconciliation. Mandela here speaks inclusively. All South Africans, he says, were attached to the soil of their particularly beautiful country, and he specifies some of these beauties in his references to “the famous jacaranda trees of Pretoria and the mimosa trees of the bushveld.” His speech anticipated the reconciliatory spirit of his presidency, in which he would reach out to his opponents and do all he could to enhance nation building.

In his address, he singles out “the masses” for their role in bringing South Africa to the present moment. Most historians would agree that apartheid had been brought down by internal resistance in the 1980s rather than by the armed struggle waged mainly from outside or by the sanctions that other countries had imposed on South Africa. On the other hand, the masses had played very little part in the negotiated settlement, which had been reached by elites of the old apartheid order and the ANC leadership.

Mandela also singles out his second deputy president, F. W. de Klerk, who had been responsible for Mandela's release. Mandela had become disillusioned with De Klerk, whom he blamed for not acting to end the political violence that had plagued the country during the years of transition and in the campaign leading up to the general election. As leader of the National Party, De Klerk had been Mandela's chief opponent, but Mandela chose to credit de Klerk with what he had done to help bring about the new order and to accept him as a colleague in the new government of national unity.

Mandela also pays tribute to the country's security forces for helping secure the election and for defending against the “blood-thirsty forces which still refuse to see the light,” a reference to those far-right whites who rejected the transition and from whom Mandela continued to fear violence might come. He reminds his listeners that the country had taken its “last steps to freedom in conditions of relative peace.” He himself had long talked of walking to freedom, and his autobiography, published later that year, was titled Long Walk to Freedom.

In the remainder of the address, Mandela looks forward to the future. He talks of healing wounds, bridging the chasms of racial division, and building. He pledges that the new government will continue the process of emancipation by liberating the people from poverty, deprivation, and discrimination and by “the construction of a complete, just and lasting peace.” In calling for unity among blacks and whites in South Africa, he refers to the nation by the common image of a rainbow, where all colors merge to form a thing of beauty—perhaps an allusion to the “Rainbow Coalition” formed by the civil rights activist and Baptist minister Jesse Jackson in the United States. As a gesture of good faith, Mandela indicates that the new government will address the issue of granting amnesty to people in prison, probably referring both to those who were imprisoned for activism and protest and more important, to those who perhaps took part in human rights violation against blacks but had come forward to confess.

The final paragraphs of the address consist of a series of short, inspirational sentences. Mandela acknowledges that there is “no easy road to freedom,” but he expresses hope that if South Africans act as a “united people,” there can be justice and peace, as well as “work, bread, water and salt for all.” He looks forward to a future without oppression and indignity, where freedom reigns and where the sun will “never set on so glorious a human achievement.”