Leadership and South Africa beyond Marikana

It’s one thing winning the revolution. It is another thing implementing its vision. That was the theme of veteran ANC activist Denis Goldberg at a meeting of ACTSA Scotland in Glasgow on Tuesday.
Billed as a speech about the Marikana massacre, it turned into a disarmingly honest and at times painful analysis of the challenges of building a fair and just South Africa in just 18 years after centuries of constitutional oppression.

Denis’s right to do that comes with provenance. Twenty two years in jail for fighting apartheid wins you that privilege. But that analysis is also a prerequisite to understanding Marikana.

Goldberg: I now have a million brothers and sisters - comrades too I hope..

It is always hard to write a report of Denis Goldberg speaking. You can rush at it in the height of the emotion or you can wait a bit and analyse. We've waited a bit.

There must be something that has half of the Scotland delegation at UNISON Conference 20101 unashamedly in tears. What is it?

Is it the straightforward honesty we treasure in Scotland, although we tend to approach it with a tad more bluntness?

Is it the knowledge that you are listening to someone who has given more to the cause than any of us will ever know?

Best wishes as Denis returns to South Africa

Denis (left) with John Stevenson and John
Nelson at Edinburgh City Chambers circa 1995

http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/siu/siujune02.html#10
After 17 years in Britain, Denis Goldberg, is going back to his South Africa homeland - not to retire of course, but to become an advisor to the Minister of Water and Forestry.

Denis has won enormous respect in UNISON and has become a great friend of the union, first working for the ANC in London, then setting up Community HEART - the charity working for health, education and reconstruction training in South Africa.