H.E. Mr. Bruce Koloane, Ambassador of South Africa.
By Roy Lie Atjam.
Leiden, June first, 2018, The Embassy of South Africa, the Africa Studies Centre Leiden and the VrijeUniversiteit Amsterdam cohosted a lecture at the Academigebouw Leiden University.
The occasion was the centenary of the birth of Nelson Mandela. Master of Ceremonies was Prof. Jan-Bart Gewald, director Africa Study Centre Leiden.
Prof. Mark Rutgers, Dean Faculty of Humanities, welcomed the guests on behalf of Rector Magnificus Prof. Carel Stolker.
H.E. Mr. Bruce Koloane, Ambassador of South Africa to the Netherlands, gave an introduction to the centenary of Nelson Mandela.
Prof Tom Lodge of Limerick University Ireland, author of the biography Mandela. A Critical Life (2006)delivered the keynote address on the leadership of Nelson Mandela (Madiba).
Prof. Tom Lodge made use of pictures to deliver his address. A brief extract of his delivery now follow .
“Mandela’s leadership would combine three qualities:
- Messianic heroism • Patrimonial authority • Strategic vision. These are three dimensions of leadership that correspond with the conventional analytical distinctions between charismatic, traditional and legal-rational types of authority.
In March 1961, after the withdrawal of charges at the end of the Treason Trial, Mandela leaves the court-room in Pretoria, accompanied by Moses Kotane.
Mandela was careful – fussy even about his appearance, about what he wore and how he appeared in public. Here (photo not available) he is dressed in his role as a member of South Africa’s tiny African professional elite.
His professional achievements were not merely instrumental for him in his political ascendancy, though they had a lot to do with it. He was a lawyer by training and vocation. Mandela lived by rules, codes and an etiquette of behaviour engrained in him by an ethos of honour learned both at his African childhood home, at the Anglophile schools he attended, and in the legal court civilities he learned.”
The centenary celebration of the birth of Nelson Mandela was, by all means, a tremendous success. Among the attendees were the Ambassadors of Nigeria, Tunisia, Rwanda, chargé d’affaires of Algeria, Morocco and others.
A reception offered by the Embassy of South Africa, concluded the celebration.
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Photography by Eelkje Colmjon-African Studies Centre Leiden, Nelson Mandela 100 Anniversary.
