Word: mandelas
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Nelson Mandela's African National Congress (ANC) remained united despite repeated efforts by its enemies to divide and destroy it during the three decades in which its leaders endured exile, prison, torture and assassination. But after 14 years as South Africa's ruling party, an internal power struggle appears to have finally torn it apart. Senior members of the party on Wednesday announced plans to leave ANC and form a new political party. At a press conference in Johannesburg, Mosiuoa "Terror" Lekota, a former political prisoner who served as national chairman of the party and defense minister, said...
...split is the culmination of three years of factional intrigue within the ANC between the supporters of ousted President Thabo Mbeki, and those of his chief rival, Jacob Zuma. Mbeki had been Mandela's deputy and became party and national president after Mandela's retirement in 1998, with Zuma as his deputy in both positions. But during Mbeki's second term, the two fell out and became bitter enemies. In 2005, Zuma's financial adviser, Shabir Shaik, was convicted of bribing Zuma in relation to a $10 billion arms deal, and was jailed for 15 years. Mbeki sacked Zuma...
...even if Zuma (pictured above) succeeds in providing stability while fulfilling promises to his leftist supporters, the status of the African National Congress (ANC) party, once the continent's most respected organ of national liberation, has been irreversibly diminished by the infighting of the past few years. Under Nelson Mandela, the ANC peerlessly wielded its moral authority. But that trait also encouraged leaders to think they were above reproach, an attitude that found its fullest expression in Mbeki, who often acted as if he had no reason to explain himself and simply asked people to take his decisions on trust...
...following year was imprisoned for his role in those events. He spent ten years behind bars on Robben Island, the infamous South African prison which held so many anti-Apartheid leaders it became known as the "university of the struggle", where he joined fellow inmate Nelson Mandela in the ANC. Upon release, he became an organizer for the National Union of Mineworkers, becoming its Secretary General in 1987. A decade later, was voted into the same position in the ANC, and became its deputy president...
...officially leave office once parliament chooses an interim successor, as it is expected to do within a month. Mbeki appeared calm and dignified as he defended his legacy of 14 years as the premier policy architect of a post-apartheid South African state, first as deputy president under Nelson Mandela from 1994 to 1999, then as head of state. But despite his demeanor, it was a bitter moment for a man who, as the son of ANC liberation hero Govan Mbeki, has often said that he was "born into the struggle...