As protests and struggles against apartheid had increased, the government realised that they could no longer keep the blacks under their rule through repression. The white regime changed its policies. Discriminatory laws were repealed. Ban on political parties and restrictions on the media were lifted. After 28 years of imprisonment, Nelson Mandela walked out of the jail as a free man. Finally, at the midnight of 26 April 1994, the new
national flag of the Republic of South Africa was unfurled marking the newly born democracy in the world. The apartheid government came to an end, paving way for the formation of a multi-racial government.
How did this come about? Let us hear Mandela, the first president of this new South Africa, on this extra- ordinary transition:
“Historical enemies succeeded in negotiating a peaceful transition from apartheid to democracy exactly because we were prepared to accept the inherent capacity for goodness in the other. My wish is that South Africans never give up on the belief in goodness, that they cherish that faith in human beings is the cornerstone of our democracy.”
After the emergence of the new democratic South Africa, black leaders appealed to fellow blacks to forgive the whites for the atrocities they had committed while in power. They said let us build a new South Africa based on equality of all races and men and women, on democratic values, social justice and human rights. The party that ruled through oppression and brutal killings and the party that led the freedom. struggle sat together to draw up a common constitution.
After two years of discussion and debate they came out with one of the finest constitutions the world has ever had. This constitution gave to its citizens the most extensive rights available in any country. Together, they decided that in the search for a solution to the problems, nobody should be excluded, no one should be treated as a demon. They agreed that everybody should become part of the solution, whatever they might have done or represented in the past. The preamble to the South African Constitution (see page 28) sums up this spirit.
The South African constitution inspires democrats all over the world. A state denounced by the entire world till 1994 as the most undemocratic one is now seen as a model of democracy. What made this change possible was the determination of the people of South Africa to work together, to transform bitter experiences into the binding glue of a rainbow nation. Speaking on the South African Constitution, Mandela said:
“The Constitution of South Africa speaks of both the past and the future. On the one hand, it is a solemn pact in which we, as South Africans, declare to one another that we shall never permit a repetition of our racist, brutal and repressive past. But it is more than that. It is also a charter for the transformation of our country into one which is truly shared by all its people- country which in the fullest sense belongs to all of us, black and white, women and men. Language: English