Unsung Heroes and Heroines: The Role of People and Organizations in South Africa's Liberation Struggle

Each in their own way, the books reviewed in this essay raise some intriguing questions about postapartheid South Africa: What makes a hero or a heroine? Is forgiveness reserved for a privileged few? Can genuine forgiveness occur without punishment? Would Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki have assumed leadership over South Africa without the support of national and international business, Western states, and multilateral institutions? Did South Africa's transition from minority rule to liberal democracy without an economic transformation seal forever the fate of freedom for Africans?

Nothing But the Truth is not so much about Ben Turok's life as an activist as it is about snapshots of key players in both the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the African National Congress (ANC). Turok joined the Congress Movement and became a political activist in three arenas: the trade unions, the underground antiapartheid movement, and the SACP. From his account, the SACP did all the thinking while the ANC took care of the implementation and presented the adopted decisions to the masses as theirs. For example, the decision to create the armed wing of the ANC, Umkhonto we Sizwe, seems to have been made by some SACP members without Moses Kotane's approval, and then it was presented to the ANC leadership (122–25).

Turok was sentenced to three years in prison for engaging in a sabotage attack. Upon release, he went into exile in Tanzania, where his attempt to work for the ANC was a failure. He then left for England, where his family settled with relative ease in North London, where he was elected to the ANC office. What is puzzling is the ease with which he and Mary (his wife) returned to the "new" South Africa: both ended up as elected members of parliament.

Nothing But the Truth is in fact nothing but. . . . Indeed, Turok's account has too many unexplained holes and gaps that raise some disturbing questions: What was Turok's exact role in the liberation struggle? Who financed his Soviet trip? How did he manage to escape with his life when most of the people around him ended up being murdered by the apartheid security forces?

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Apartheid's violence and its capacity to victimize both the colonizer and colonized exposed also informs Winnie Mandela: A Life. Anné Mariè du Preez Bezdrob gives an account of Winifred Nomzamo—"she who will endure trials"—Madikizela-Mandela's role in the liberation struggle. A circle of friends and informers surrounded Madikizela. Ironically, two of the first spies came to her on Nelson Mandela's recommendation. Shall we ever know what really happened to Madikizela while she was imprisoned? The torture, the lies, the screaming, and isolation had a tremendous psychological impact on her. In 1969 the police promised to release her if she persuaded the ANC to abandon armed resistance as a condition for negotiations. She rejected the offer, and as the torture increased she fell in and out of consciousness. What happens to the soul under torture? In the twenty-seven years of imprisonment, Nelson Mandela said that the three days that...