Nelson Mandela is by all means an exemplary son of Africa and his journey from a jailbird to President should inspire the young and the elders of the great continent. Arthur Pearse, the American businessman selling the Magnetizer products, called me once again during the evening. The line was clear and the conference was on and I heard the tiny voices of dozens of American children eager to hear about the man.

I visited South Africa at least once and that was enough for me to understand the importance of Nelson Mandela and the necessity for his release from Robben Island where he was kept for more than 30 years as a political prisoner. I also knew that the South Africa regime was in power mostly thanks to the tacit approval of its policies by the United States of America.

The US was criticizing Pretoria and its white regime for the ills of the country and for the apartheid system but it appeared to me that they did not know what they were talking about. While in Johannesburg, I saw and in disgust, how the people of South Africa were struggling and what apartheid meant.

It was pure segregation of the black people from the white people. It was horrible to see the signs on bars with “White only” written on them or the ‘Black only” signs for toilets which were of much lower standards than the “White only” toilets.

The US kids were very interested to hear about the toilets and the bars and restaurants where only whites were accepted and the busses and taxis that allowed only blacks or only whites. The Indians, the Pakistanis or Arabs and Malays were all treated differently from the Whites.

However, it was clear that the blacks were mistreated badly while the Indians-Pakis were given a leverage which made them higher in the society than the blacks while they were still regarded as lower in class than the whites. A real racist system was buzzing with activities while the black people were lingering in poverty in Soweto and near Elizabethville.

Then I was asked the most important question by the children from Pensylvania. They asked what the US could do to stop the horrifying apartheid system in South Africa. My reply was not going to confuse them, they were 8 to 10 year olds but from what I could hear during the conference, they were really concerned by the issue and were advanced in their ‘General Paper’.

The US had to stop supporting the apartheid regime in South Africa. It had to cut off all business links, transactions and official or secret deals with the regime that was shamefully discrediting humanity. The next thing that will happen if the US take steps to completely severe its ties with South Africa would be the inevitable release of Mr Mandela. And I said to the children that they should probably write to their Senators and Congressmen or the White House to press for the suspension of all relationships between the American government and the South Africans at that time.

I was talking to these children because of Mandela. It was all about the man who in Robben Island and who was in jail for so many decades. The response from the children was wonderful. A month later I received a booklet from the United States. It was about Nelson Mandela indeed but it was 30 pages of paintings, some done with incredible talent, about the leader of the African National Congress (ANC).

All the messages were the same: Freedom for Mr. Mandela and thanks to Mr. Kazi. I was proud that my name was associated with a giant from Africa. I was also happy that I delivered the message of freedom of the individual and freedom of speech well to the American children.

Today when I reflect on this 1 hour conferencing with the school of Philadelphia I realize that in those days – it was the mid 1990’s – America was different as it was fighting for the freedom of an individual in Africa. Today America has changed and the same children who are now in their early 20’s are being indoctrinated with a different idea of the world: that of war and enslavement of others.

America is now hunting for the Mujahideen which it accuses of having carried out the 911 incident in the US. It has changed its language of freedom into that of war and torture. It has accepted, barely a decade and a half after the freeing of Mandela from jail, all the evil that the apartheid regime was carrying out on Mandela and on his friends in the ANC.

The pole of freedom and liberty has changed, or rather shifted from the US to that of the fighters who are willing to die to defend their countries against US aggression. We are living dark ages but with prayer and hope and if we listen more to people like Mandela and Yasser Arafat or Mahatma Gandhi, we might find reason to negotiate and to discuss with the new ‘freedom’ fighters.

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