From terrorist to freedom fighter: Ahmed Kathrada

Vidya Rao

At 76 years old, Ahmed Kathrada is an aging warrior these days.

He spent 26 years on Robben Island, one of the world’s most notorious prisons, and were it not for his more internationally famous prison mates, Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu among them, he might not be remembered — outside of South Africa — in the historic fight against apartheid.

But that is not the case. Kathrada is free. Free to speak. Free to write. And free to travel.

“We were in prison for a long time,” Kathrada said. “We had many deprivations, one of them being freedom of speech.”

Starting a six-week tour around the United States, Kathrada spoke at a conference held last week by the Harvard Business School in part to promote his autobiography, “Memoirs.”

Released in July, “Memoirs” is Kathrada’s attempt to set the record straight on South Africa’s freedom movements. “…much, if not most, of what had been published in books, newspapers and magazines was incomplete or riddled with error and distortion,” Kathrada writes.

Kathrada was asked to speak at the Harvard Business School as part of their Leadership Initiative program, a seemingly ironic choice as Kathrada had been involved with South Africa’s communist party since the age of 12, fighting for social justice. However, as Professor Linda Hill, chair of the Leadership Initiative, explained: “The mission of the leadership initiative is to build a global community of individuals committed to addressing key leadership challenges.”

By all accounts, Kathrada faced numerous, often violent “leadership challenges” as one of leaders of the most influential and important social movements.

Apartheid, a system of strict racial separation that unofficially dates back to the beginning of white settlement in South Africa in 1652, categorized people into four main racial groups: Whites, Asians, Coloureds and Bantu (black Africans). In 1948, this social practice was systemized into law under the Nationalist Party, creating racist and segregationist policies even more brutal than American Jim Crow laws, restricting the African majority to less than 13 percent of the country’s land—land that was also devoid of resources.

During the conference at Harvard, Kathrada said that his understanding of racial politics did not develop until he was forced to attend a separate school for Indians in Johannesburg, hours away from his home. At the age of 17, Kathrada left school to work full time with the Transvaal Passive Resistance Council, launching a resistance movement against the Ghetto Act, a law which severely limited Indian political involvement and restricted where they could live, trade and own land.

Kathrada, along with other leaders in the freedom movement lead the charge to form a long-term alliance of disenfranchised peoples for the 1952 Defiance Campaign, in which volunteers practiced civil disobedience against many of the unjust laws of apartheid.

By 1959, the nonviolent movement was so strong that the government called a state of emergency, giving the security forces the right to detain people without trial. Over 18,000 people, mostly black, were arrested, including much of the ANC leadership. Many of those not arrested were forced underground.

It was then that the ANC decided to abandon its mantra of passive resistance and begin armed struggle.

“Since there were individual and organization bans, it was virtually impossible for us to be politically active,” Kathrada explained. “The increasing repression was a motivating factor for armed struggle, and though we had no illusion of military victory, we wanted to put added pressure on the government to bring them to the negotiating table.”

In July 1963, 34-year-old Kathrada, Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela and other members of the ANC underground leadership were arrested on grounds of treason, with all being sentenced to life the following year in what is known as the Rivonia Trial.

“What happens is that when you do political work, illegal political work, you know that sooner or later you are going to be arrested,” he said. “When the arrests came, naturally they came with a shock, but after a while, you adjust,” added Kathrada.

Kathrada and others kept sane during their seemingly indefinite imprisonment by focusing on the big picture.

“While we were suffering, our comrades were having it worse outside [prison], being assassinated, tortured, hanged,” he says. “At least we were protected.”

While in prison, Kathrada, Sisulu and Mandela found solace in the international community’s criticism of apartheid.

“It was the knowledge that at the same time that our struggle was gaining momentum, international solidarity was gaining momentum — that gave us strength. In the U.S., even the democrats would not openly support us, but behind the scenes they did quite a lot to save us from the gallows,” he told the Banner.

Kathrada also points to the U.N.’s critical response to apartheid as well as the divestment campaign spearheaded by university students, which added pressure on the South African government to end apartheid.

On Oct. 10, 1989, Kathrada, Mandela and six other political prisoners were released as part of the government negotiations. In 1994, South Africa held its first democratic, fully-inclusive elections.

“Millions of our people queued up for hours and hours [to vote],” Kathrada explains. “There was this sense that this was what we had been deprived of all of our lives, and now that we have fought and won this very right to vote, nothing would keep us away from the polls. And all South Africa had that experience. People voted in the millions and brought the ANC to power.”

The election ended with Nelson Mandela as president of South Africa, implementing policies to begin racial equalization, while trying to maintain peace with formerly privileged whites.

“A lot of people cannot understand Mandela being imprisoned for 27 years, suffering the humiliation because he’s black and emerging without bitterness and hatred,” says Kathrada. “But this is consistent with the policy of the organization, the ANC.”

Today, Kathrada is retired from his work in government and is enjoying his role as one of South Africa’s most revered leaders. He even smiled about the role of business in the new South Africa.

“Business is playing a very positive role in South Africa,” he answered. “We have Mercedes-Benz being manufactured and black people having economic opportunities. With everything they have been denied, why shouldn’t blacks go into business, why shouldn’t they become rich?”

In response to criticism that South Africa still has a long way to go in terms of achieving racial equality, Kathrada, ever thoughtful, offered a suggestion. “You in America have had democracy for hundreds of years, yet you haven’t solved your racial or economic problems,” Kathrada said. “Most of the disadvantaged would feel more at home in South Africa.”