The following is from a friend, Jackie Shandu, who lives in South Africa.
Farewell Mandela. And again, thanks for political rights. We are now left with the mammoth task of completing the struggles of Bhambatha, Sekhukhune, Hintsa, Moshoeshoe and countless other heroes and heroines. The struggles for land, bread and dignity. Peace is meaningless and frankly nonexistent in the midst of subjugation, marginalization and exploitation. There is no peace in the ghetto, but hunger, hopelessness, rape, and murder. Peace at the expense of justice is not peace for those who are denied justice continue to be the wretched of the earth just like in the previous era.
Nelson Mandela's legacy is now effectively used by his erstwhile enemies to block even a discussion about justice. We are expected to always smile at the settlers and pretend to have accepted them as fellow compatriots when we know and see them continuing to suck our blood in broad daylight. All strategies and ploys are devise to sell the rainbow nation dream when we witness sheer arrogance and racism displayed by descendants of colonialists. They continue to fatten themselves with the vast wealth this beautiful country has whilst we starve in front of them.
Confrontation is inevitable. The blacks are no longer prepared to be subservient beings in the land of their forefathers. They are no longer willing to be homeless and impoverished in their homeland.
Overtime Mandela became a huge liability to the struggle for real emancipation of the black majority. He watched whites used his supposed sainthood to justify raping his own people. As a result, millions of black children in Mandela's home province, the Eastern Cape, are learning under trees with empty stomachs.
Mandela's gigantic statue in Sandton is cannot be ignored, drugs its admirers into instant euphoria and fake cohesion but the people who marched and died for his release in nearby Alexandra are left to starve and die on their own. Mandela said he fought against black domination, something we still don't understand and will never accept from a man who was born and grew up under crude and heartless oppression by white savages. Now that Mandela and his supposed magic are gone the struggle for social justice begins. This generation will not be lied to.
This generation will not celebrate its own betrayal even when decorated as miraculous victory. Goodbye Nelson Mandela, you are one of the biggest frauds in modern history. Loved by enemies world over because you postpone indefinitely the freedom of the people you purportedly sought to liberate. I'm glad you are gone, because you are one man.
One man that almost single handedly killed the dreams of multitudes. You're a flawed man, like all of us, but your mistakes were too expensive.
I won't cry, I ha e no tears for you. I wept for Chris Hani. I cried for Oliver Tambo. And I was not faking it. The people of Sandton will shed enough tears.