Ahmed Kathrada - Anti-Apartheid activist HARDtalk

Welcome to HARDtalk I'm Sarah Montague.

My guest today is one of the big names of the apartheid struggle

in South Africa.

Ahmed Kathrada was sentenced to life imprisonment alongside

Nelson Mandela on Robben Island, spending 26 years of his

life in prison.

On their release, Nelson Mandela persuaded him to join him

in government, an experience he did not like, but he has never

stopped campaigning for the ideals of freedom

on which the anti-apartheid movement was based.

Has South Africa lived up to those ideals?

Ahmed Kathrada, welcome to HARDtalk Thank you for having me.

When you think back 50 years ago, what were the ideals

for which you are fighting?

In one sentence?

It was for a non-racial, non-sexist, democratic South Africa.

That sums up the whole struggle.

That sums up the whole struggle?

But, for you, there were years of what became

an incredibly difficult life?

You were arrested more than 18 times?

You spent 26 years of your life in prison?

There must have been times when you thought that this

wasn't for you.

There was no such thought at all.

The activities for which we were arrested, we already knew

what the consequences could be.

Many of our colleagues were hanged.

Others were tortured to death, some were assassinated.

We had an idea of what it could be.

Prison was a bonus because many of our colleagues didn't live

to see it.

You knew the price that you would have to pay.

Was there a moment when you were young which you felt was such

an outrage that you committed your life to it?

Was it just a way of living?

It was an afterthought because I was born in a little

country town about 200 miles from Johannesburg.

When the time came to go to school, I was not admitted into the white

school nor into the black school.

There was no Indian school.

So at the age of eight, I had to be sent to Johannesburg

which was 200 miles away, the school.

At that age, it is not politics.

One starts to wonder why I was not admitted into the schools

of my friends because, as children, we played and we didn't know colour.

You are playing alongside black and white...?

Black and white.

Our immediate neighbours were white.

As children, children don't know colour.

You become friends, you quarrel and become friends again.

It wasn't politics.

It was a young man questioning why couldn't go to school

with my friends.

But coming into Johannesburg, of course, I came face-to-face

with apartheid, raw apartheid, which was not noticeable

in the little country town in which I was born.

Raw apartheid: In what way?

How did it manifest?

The first time, I saw boards in front of restaurants,

hotels, libraries, trams, parks, saying "Europeans only,

non- Europeans not allowed." There were even board that said

"Non- Europeans and dogs are not allowed." That,

I saw, for the first time in Johannesburg,

not in the rural areas.

When living with that, I wonder how often you are angry.

Is there a constant sense of rage at the injustice?

There was not much room for anger.

As I said, the expectation was worse.

Before we were brought up for trial in the Rivonia trial,

there was a law that allowed the police to detain political

suspects for three months at a time in complete isolation.

No visitors allowed, no lawyers, no newspapers, no books.

The only visitor one gets are the police and they come

from time to time with one message only: Give us this bit

of information or you are going to die, you are going to hang.

So you are by yourself.

You are incommunicado.

All the thoughts in your mind are death.

They come in and tell you that you are going to die unless you give

us this information.

One has to steel oneself not to talk.

Not to answer questions.

And, fortunately, I managed that.

The other fortunate thing is that I was not tortured physically

unlike many of my friends and colleagues.

Some were tortured to death.

Others survived.

Some went into parliament, others stuck around.

Initially, it was non-violent but around 1960, a number

of things happened.

There was the Sharpeville Massacre in which 69 people were killed.

The ANC were banned and there was a decision that violence should

begin in the east.

How did you feel about that?

About...?

About the ANC decision to begin using violence?

To make it an armed struggle?

I accepted that.

Especially after the banning of the ANC and the other

organisations, the avenues of peaceful protest came to a halt.

There was no other way out.

That is when the ANC set up a wing for the armed struggle.

It was never envisaged that there would be a military victory.

Because the first phase of the armed struggle was recruiting,

training recruits in the manufacture and planting of bombs.

These were to be planted - the targets, rather,

where these places which had the sign saying that non-

Europeans were not allowed.

But every recruit, and there were cells of three,

they had to take an oath that when the bombs were planted,

there would be no injury to human beings.

But their work...

The original intention...

There were a couple of instances...

And there were numerous bombings and at least 63 people died

as a result.

And there were a few and if I'm correct, they were done

by what we called MK units, some of them in violation

of their discipline.

You mentioned the Rivonia Trial which was significant for a number

of reasons, the trial in which you and Nelson Mandela

and others were sent to Robben Island.

It was also significant because of what was said

at the trial, not least by Nelson Mandela himself.

He said that it was not a criminal case, but a political one.

It was deliberate policy on your part, the group

of you standing trial, wasn't it?

We had four of the most senior leaders of the ANC among the eight

of us who were tried.

Right from the beginning, under their leadership,

it was decided that this should be a political trial.

We the accused, together with our lawyers, turned it

into a political trial, not a criminal trial.

Mandela, in his four-hour speech, I think, to the court,

set the tone of what the defence case would be.

It was a turn you had all agreed to in advance?

Yes.

This is where he said what he fought for and if need be,

he hoped to die?

That was how he ended his address.

Not all of us gave evidence.

Those of us who did took the cue from what Mr Mandela said

in beginning the defence case.

In other words, when he went into the witness box,

you proclaim your political beliefs.

You do not apologise.

You do not ask for mercy.

And when there is a death sentence which was factored into it

until the last day, there can be no appeal to a higher court.

That was how the whole case was conducted.

As I said, Mandela set the lead and those of us who gave evidence

followed in that example.

That trial about which you wrote afterwards, you wrote a letter

from Robben Island in which you said that it was sad to see former

comrades who you loved and respected coming one by one into the witness

box to give evidence and it hurts when these people tell lies,

some of them unashamedly.

There were a couple who were in fairly senior positions

who gave evidence.

There were others who gave evidence whose role was very minor.

In fact, some of them did not even know that they were carrying

on political work.

For instance, there were owners of vehicles who were used to smuggle

people out of the country.

They were told that these were football team is going to Botswana.

Eventually, they discovered this but they played ball.

People betrayed you?

I would not call it betrayal.

They were severely tortured.

I do not know if I would have held out under that torture.

There is a very tight group of you who were standing trial.

Later, you said about Nelson Mandela's death

that you were...

"Now I have lost a brother.

My life is a void and I do know to whom to turn." This

is as a result of your shared experiences.

He played a very special role in my life.

As I said, I had come to Johannesburg at the age of eight

but as the years went by, and I got involved

with the Young Communist League and the Indian Youth Congress

and so forth, in that capacity, I met Walter Sisulu and the others.

My biological father had died when I was 14.

Gradually, I regarded Sisulu as my father in fact.

I could turn to him for the most personal advice.

You mentioned Silvia Hill.

She was white.

And when I started the relationship with her, I consulted with Sisulu -

I told him about the association.

If we get caught, it can have a negative impact

on our struggle, our organisation - that was what I thought.

His response was: We are against all racial laws,

including the Immorality Act and Mixed Marriages Act.

Just be careful.

But if you get caught, we will stand by you.

Just be careful.

One of the members of your family, Nelson Mandela, not just

on Robben Island but Pollsmoore, where you shared a cell with him.

But earlier, what was that like?

That was the first time, after 18 years on Robben Island,

when there were transfers.

It was the first time we were in one cell.

On Robben Island, in the 18 years we spent there,

we were in single cells.

The only time we met and talked was at work when we did the pick

and shovel work in the quarry.

That was when we could work together and talk.

Once we were locked up, we were not allowed to talk.

So because there were only five political prisoners there,

things were more relaxed.

So to be sharing a cell, that was...

We were sharing a cell until we were transferred in 1982.

For three years we were together in one cell, and then Mr Mandela

was separated from us.

He was kept at the prison, but away from us.

That is when he started talking to the other side.

When you did eventually get out, he persuaded

you to go into government.

He offered you a seat, you turned down a Cabinet seat.

He offered you an ANC position as adviser and you didn't like it.

I wonder why?

You had struggled your whole life to change Africa and now you had

an opportunity to do so.

What did you dislike about it?

Not all of us were aiming to go into Parliament.

I was working in his office of course, for the five years.

I was elected a Member of Parliament.

For some reason, I just did not like that kind of life.

What you did was to set up a foundation.

Much later.

One of its aims was to campaign for the Freedom Charter.

That was a document from 1955.

That was a document from 1955.

It talked about freedom, all people having rights.

People sharing the country's wealth.

The land being shared among those who worked it.

A very radical redistribution of wealth within South Africa.

South Africa is a long way from achieving that.

Do you think it can?

Do you still want it to?

Unlike other colonial countries, our oppressors were not foreigners.

They were South Africans.

So our policy took that into account, that these

are fellow countrypersons.

Not a few thousand, but a few million.

Our policy had to take that into account.

So that if you tried to implement everything we have said on that

platform and so forth, when you come into government,

you are dealing with reality.

In terms of what the government set out to achieve, at the end

of apartheid almost 90% of the land was owned by whites,

who made up 10% of the population.

The aim was to transfer about 30% of that land to blacks.

So far only about 7.5% has been.

It is 20 years since apartheid.

Is that enough progress?

Again, when we say that most of the land that can be used

for agriculture was in white hands.

But again, you face the reality.

You are not dealing with enemies any more.

And we are not going to do anything foolish by turning these

people against us.

We have to work with them.

The policy was in practice.

We didn't know how to run huge farms.

We didn't know how to run industry.

We didn't have engineers.

We, on every ministry, we relied on the white society.

When you look at what senior politicians have done and been

criticised for, for example the Public Protector,

Thuli Madonsela, who told Parliament, all I can tell

the committee is that corruption has

reached crisis proportions.

There are no two ways about it.

As I say, as a member of the ANC, I have admiration for the Public

Protector.

The Public Protector, the public itself, these

are all institutions to protect our democracy.

Let's talk about another campaign.

Another campaign in another country.

You see you visualise your fellow freedom fighter, Marwan Barghouti,

and other Palestinian prisoners, and you have campaigned vociferously

for his release.

You say he is in a similar situation, and arguably a worse

situation, than Nelson Mandela.

The ANC policy has always regarded the PLO as a sister organisation.

An ally organisation.

That is the policy of our government as well.

We have close ties with the PLO.

Although western countries were not happy with that.

When Mr Mandela came out of prison he was advised to break ties

with Castro and with the PLO.

His response was very simple.

To the western leaders, when we came to you for assistance,

you condemned us as terrorists.

It would be ungrateful and immoral of us now to turn our backs on those

who supported us.

Is it solely because they supported you?

You will know that Alan Butler, whose son was injured,

and he was injured, when a bus was bombed in Jerusalem.

He said the media had attempted to portray Marwan Barghouti

as a kind of Nelson Mandela.

The truth is quite the opposite.

He has shown no remorse for his activities.

Mandela showed no remorse for what we had done.

In fact we have been proud of what we have done.

We can't prescribe to another country how they should

run their struggle.

My own view is that I continue to support the Palestinian struggle,

once the leaders have decided this is

the road we will take.

Is their use of violence justified?

If so, that is not for me to say.

But if they in their wisdom resort to violence as the only method,

I will support them.

I have been to Palestine.

I have seen what it is like.

It is the only colony in the world today, colony of Islam.

I have seen in Palestine what didn't exist under the worst

days of apartheid.

So your support is unconditional?

My support is wholehearted.

I take my cue from what they do.

I don't prescribe to them.

So far there is no reason for me to criticise

the Palestinian leadership.

The African Zionist foundation has accused

Marwan Barghouti of being a terrorist guilty

of multiple crimes against humanity.

I am not surprised at that.

They have tried to turn...

Let me take this as an individual, because I have been

outspoken on Palestine.

They have been trying to misinterpret us

as being anti-Jewish.

Anti-semitic.

We are not.

We are critical of Israel.

That does not make us anti-Jewish.

Some of our leaders are Jewish.

So many...

Ruth Slovo.

I grew up with her.

She was killed by a bomb.

She is Jewish.

So I can never be anti-Jewish.

Our struggle can never be anti-Jewish.

When you at times think about what has happened,

do you summon rage?

Do you ever feel anger?

I never did.

I never felt angry.

We came out of prison, and before our policy was reconciliation.

Following from that policy of reconciliation,

is lack of bitterness.

No revenge.

No hatred.

Policy-wise, and in practice, that is the only way forward.

These are negative emotions, revenge, bitterness.

In the end, people who harbour those emotions suffer more.

So we don't want to spend our lives with negative emotions.

We have to face the reality of this day.

Ahmed Kathrada, thank you for coming on HARDtalk.

Most welcome.

Hello there.

The next few days are looking more unsettled, more cloud and outbreaks