The little girl who called Mandela stupid

Morris Mtisi
She was 5, only five. She appeared at the gate and asked to see Mr Mandela. His body guards must have laughed and thought what a little joker and dreamer she was. The little white girl insisted. The body guards went to Mandela. “Your Excellence, a little girl is at the gate. She says she wants to see you…and she insists.”

“Let her in,” said Mandela.

“But she is very cheeky,” the bodyguards warned.

“Precisely for that reason, please let her in,” Mandela said.

The little girl enters Nelson Mandela’s august office.

She does not greet him. She looks straight into his face. Straight away she interviews him.

“How old are you?”

Mandela: I’m very old.

Little girl: Exactly how many years old?

Mandela: I cannot remember.

Little girl: You went to jail . . . for how long did you stay there?

Mandela: A long long time.

Little girl: Who sent you to jail?

Mandela: People who did not like me.

Little girl: How long were you in there, two years, three, four years?

Mandela: I cannot remember, but much more than two or three years.

The 5-year-old girl took a long stare at Mandela and said what he (Mandela) would never forget for the rest of his life. “You are a very stupid old man, aren’t you?”

As a Literature specialist myself, obsessed, perhaps addicted to critical analysis of stories people write or tell in speech, I had quite a few questions on my mind after listening to this story told by Mandela himself. “How on earth could State President Mandela say the little 5-year-old girl must come into his office? How did he know she was not a suicide bomber? Well, the Mandela I read and got to know a lot about could easily do that. He had a religious love for children.

Second, “Was the little girl serious or was joking with the first black President of South Africa?”

My sixth sense, or is it power of literary judgment, tells me this little girl was very serious. She perhaps wetted her pants for a long time to see the famous Mandela and tell him her piece of mind, namely he was very stupid to go to jail for 27 years.

I can imagine in the little girl’s mind she could have wondered how such a clever, wise, learned man could go to jail (Robben Island) for something like 22 long years and another 4 to 5 years elsewhere on this or that mainland maximum prison in South Africa. To achieve what, the little girl must have asked herself? What exactly made it really worth the time and isolation from his wife and children? OK fine, what now is the prize or price of such a ‘stupid’ sacrifice? You went to jail for so many years . . . so what now?”

The little story about the 5-year-old girl is true. It is not a parable or folk tale. It was told by Nelson Mandela himself at the end of his speech to an audience of scholars, students and admirers at Harvard University on one of his few tours of USA during his honourably short tenure of office as President of South Africa. It may make you laugh. It didn’t make me laugh. It made me think.

What are the lessons learnt from the story? Why is the story relevant to us in Zimbabwe?

The lessons are as many and varied as can be. Response to literary stimuli varies from individual to individual depending on level of critical ability, thought and persuasion in life-perhaps even level of learnedness. The level of mental derangement or depth of insanity too cannot be ruled out. Critical Appreciation: There are people young and or old who see Independence or those who brought it about, namely heroes and heroines, as stupid people who did stupid things they think were great achievements. This little girl who called Mandela stupid is only one of them. The question that comes to mind is, “How many other little girls thought the same?” Heaven or hell knows! Oh,I forgot to ask, ‘Do you think the little girl was stupid herself?”

Next question is, “If little children grow up with such an attitude, or is it mentality, will they change at a certain stage in their lives and begin to honour and respect Independence and those who fought to bring it about?” Many may say, “Yes, they will change.” I have my own doubts.

Another question is, “Is it only 5 year old children who harbour such notions about historical icons, some historical heroes and heroines?” The truth may say, ‘Well, this can only come from a child,’ but the whole truth and nothing but the truth may be another. Food for thought!

Have you heard our own born frees, political correctness dictates we must stop calling them that, say, “These so-called war heroes can go tie the country where they freed it from? We can go and free it ourselves the way we want.” They must be mad or stupid, aren’t they? Keep the answer to yourself. But here is a crop or generation of young Zimbos who have no respect for Independence, those who brought it about and what it means for all of us.

Back to the little girl who took Mandela head-on. Is there a possibility that she might have heard several times from some adult source what she finally decided to reveal to Mandela, namely that he was a stupid old man? I do not know what you may think. I am strongly tempted to think so.

So what do we conclude ladies and gentlemen? Simple! We can conclude that little crabs cannot walk straight if the mother crab is walking sideways. We must never allow little crabs to think walking sideways is walking straight because the mothers do so. All crabs, young ones or the parents walk sideways. We cannot say they walk straight because it is a family style or philosophy of walking. How can the adult crabs teach the little crabs to walk straight? One way! By walking straight themselves! They cannot blame the little crabs for walking sideways when every day they see them walking sideways.

We can liken the little 5 year old girl who called Mandela stupid to a little crab. She walked the walk of the mother, or was it the father crab? She talked the talk of the mother-father crab. It is that simple.

How do we make sure crabs, young or old walk straight? By educating them(especially at an early age) that this is not the way to walk straight but more importantly by walking straight ourselves so they have some role model, some reference to copy from, some model to emulate.

Independence holiday has come and gone. Heroes Holiday is on 8 and 9 August 2016, four months down the line. How can we separate Independence from the heroes and heroines who brought it? Certainly not separable! This Independence Day just gone by- 18 April, reminded some of us of the heroes and heroines who made the freedom, the independence possible. Genuine freedom fighters who fought and died to make us live with dignity. Certainly the commemoration of one is the commemoration of the other. In my written appreciation of the heroes’ commemorations-Towards Heroes Holiday on one of the Manica Post Liberation War Files-titled Cde Pfepferere’s Sad Death Revisited, I appealed for a little bit of thoughtful writing and reporting. I did so for one purpose: To help create a genuine and everlasting appreciation of those who died to see Zimbabwe free…not themselves free. Like Tendai Pfepferere they chose death, not only chose death and lived, but actually died so that Zimbabweans would live and live with dignity in their motherland.

This is exactly how we must feel on all 18 Aprils. And Heroes Holidays!

Pfepferere died to make students at Tsambe- St Augustine’s mission live. It is my hope that there is no 5 year old girl amongst the students at Tsambe today who says, “Like Nelson Mandela who fought apartheid for 27 years, Tendai Pfepferere was stupid to come to a school and meet his death.” I was perplexed but not without understanding of common poverty of reasoning when two fellows asked me, one of them a war veteran too, “What did he want at the school?” How people easily forget that freedom fighters were human beings too. They were those brothers and sisters of ours. Fighting and living in the bush did not make them wild animals. Their needs were exactly the same as those of the people they were fighting to free: love, food, clothes, interaction. Nature does not cease to be active because one is living or operating under unnatural conditions. They wanted at TSAMBE what every human being would have needed. If we as a country continue to ‘force’ or teach our grandchildren to sing songs of praise to us without encouraging them to be proud of being independent grandsons and daughters of heroes and heroines, living products of proud war veterans, political heroes and heroines, soon they will act like the little 5 year old girl and call those who freed this country for them stupid. Soon they will be tired of writing poems, singing and praising their grandmothers and fathers or ancestors at the expense of their own historical attachment to that freedom, that independence.

They want to catch the ball of freedom in their hands, to feel its warmth or smoothness, and say this is now ours and it belongs to us who are a generation of proud heirs of the fruits of freedom fighting. Not abuse their right to be young and be children by forcing them to sing and recite praises about ancestors other than themselves!. The Independence Holiday now gone by, and Heroes’ Holiday in August, must be times to proudly and openly display the harvest of armed struggle to our children. It is the time to remind them that people died to bring Zimbabwe from Rhodesia.

Children are little heroes themselves because their grandmothers and fathers were heroes who brought this and that you see today in your hands and enjoy. They want to hear us say to them, “You are young heroes and heroines too because your grandfathers and mothers were heroes of the liberation struggle. You are the blood of the blood of heroes, flesh of the flesh of war veterans. Write poems, compose and sing songs about yourselves as the natives of freedom. The war of liberation has no end. Generations come and go continuing to fight for betterment of their lives through opportunities brought about by the same war of liberation.

Even Christianity does not teach people to sing Hossana! Hossana!-only, and the great works of Jesus Christ. It teaches them (Christians) to live in Christ and own his grace, his love, the freedom he brought, his greatness. It teaches them to trust in his promises and his Father’s. And or But what does the living Jesus do? Remember our Jesus lives today. He delivers the promises to them and asks them to rejoice in their own eternal freedom as recipients of his grace, not as empty handed hero-worshippers. In the hero Jesus, those who believe in him become heroes too. They cease to become mere worshippers but winners of the gains of becoming Christ’s followers.

Heroes Holiday or Independence Day, the difference is clearly the same, must be a time to reflect, not just shouting praises about our freedom or those who died for it, but to find meaning and purpose in Independence which essentially is what they died for. Not just time to eat mombes, drink heavily and dance. It is time for every Zimbabwean to think. Why do we live these celebrations and commemorations to politicians and their parties alone? Where are the churches in this? Were they not freed too here on earth on their motherland? Are they too not independent?

Why do they only remember the first freedom which freed them into the grace of the Father? Is it not simple for churches to realize that Jesus freed them from Satan as these war veterans, these genuine heroes and heroines freed them from earthly bondage perpetrated by new-age Pharaohs and Philistines?

Where are schools in all this? Was it not in schools that most of the freedom fighters were recruited? What activities do schools do to remember these heroes in the process of making that heroism their own too? What projects are at schools to symbolize this great history, this universal victory brought by selfless fighters? We see in almost all schools culture huts and projects. That is good. They make our Culture unforgettable. But where are war heroes’ projects, monuments, writings, research papers, essays, films, plays, to make the people’s war of liberation immortal? What are we all doing to make this historical victory and achievement visible and genuinely cherished without taking anyone by force? Why do we force people, especially children, to remember, respect, honour and celebrate their heroism? Well, it can work, sometimes, but only for as long as we are alive. The day we are all dead and gone, if we are not thoughtful and careful, they will say, like the girl that called Mandela stupid, we were also very stupid… FOOD FOR THOUGHT.

I will publish this food for thought again, word to word, during the week of this year’s Heroes Holiday commemorated 8th and 9th August. I promise you. Watch the space!

• The sentiments, thoughts and views expressed in this writing are not necessarily those of The Manica Post. Morris Mtisi is a self motivated social commentator, writer, educationist and free thinker who belongs to the school of thought of open mindedness and free thinking. You can contact him on cell number 0773 883 293 (also on WhatsApp) and email address > [email protected]