As we mourn Africa's greatest son (so far), I have taken time to reflect on what Mandela meant to me and how he changed me as a person.
I am an ardent student of great leaders of the world; I study them to find out what distinguishes them and how each excelled.
As an African boy, I was closely studying Mandela's first actions as a leader when he came out of jail, and subsequently became the first black president of a multi-racial South Africa. Most politically active Nigerian students may have done same.
So, here we go.

LESSON 1.

For me, the GREATEST moment of Nelson Mandela leadership was on April 10, 1993 when Chris Hani (arguably Nelson Mandela's heir apparent ) was assasinated. This was obviously done by right wing extremists in South Africa to scuttle the march towards democratic change. South Africa tithered on the brink of a civil war precipice. Anger was swelling like a vicious tempest. Then stepped in Nelson Mandela to take charge. I remember watching the speech he gave at Chris Hani's funeral (watched it one of the international channels then), and even as a kid then, I deeply appreciated the mastery of his speech. He spoke in all the major South African languages, and at the end, every anger was doused and the nation moved on to eventual elections in 1994.

Lesson learned: Meekness and focus (he humbled himself, refused to be provoked, deeply understood the end game, and stayed focused on it).


LESSON 2.

After he became president, South Africa was still going through a post-apartheid violence, much of which originated during apartheid. Murder was the order of the day in South Africa (still is but to much lesser extent). South Africa became the murder capital of the world. Then came in advisers of all shades and hues. They recommended DEATH PENALTY for capital offences. Nelson Mandela stood in the way and completely rejected the idea.
He also ensured that death penalty was NOT allowed in the new constitution. On this issue alone, I cannot find ANY LEADER IN AFRICA or even the world that matches Nelson Mandela. He understood that death penalty is not a punishment, but an irrational angry mob reflex which dehumanises ALL participants in it. He taught me that state sanctioned judicial murders (termed capital punishment) does not belong in civilized human culture. He preferred life imprisonment to capital punishment. On this issue, I still struggle to follow and accept, BUT I clearly see the light in his position. No human institution (whether individual or group) should be allowed to take the life of any human being on this earth.
Again, on this issue, there is no Nigerian leader (so far) that can grasp Nelson Mandela's light.

Lesson learned: Truly great leaders seldom follow the crowd. THEY LEAD.


LESSON 3.

For much of the years of the African National Congress existence as a liberation movement, Nelson Mandela played second fiddle to others, even up to the Rivonia trial that landed him in jail for 27 years. He ceded the position of ANC president to Oliver, R Tambo and to all other ANC activists. He understood that he alone could achieve nothing, in fact, he never took a position (even on issue of armed struggle) until other ANC leaders had.
The truth is that he, even as one of the founders of Mkomtho we Ziswe (MK) the armed wing of ANC, he was only a figure head, and that still landed him in jail. When he came out of jail, he waited until the ANC had conducted a convention to elect him president of ANC before exercising the power of that position. In fact ANC stayed together mainly because of his personal sacrifice in that direction. Now, contrast that with what has been happening in ANC since Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma took over the reins of the party. Even today, the ANC is in dire straits of disunity.

Lesson learned: Lead from behind most of the time. Only take frontal lead on issues of deep transformation.


I personally have not seen ANY Nigerian that can even remotely match Nelson Mandela's sagacity, but I'm not saying that there can never be. It all depends on what befalls Nigerian students of Nelson Mandela like myself.
Nairaland rants apart, I deeply appreciate the impact this man made to my life.

Hamba kahle Madiba!

Signed

Onlytruth

@Onlytruth,

This is a great post.

If there is one quibble, here, it concerns the point you made about the death penalty. Like so many other decisions taken at the time, that was not simply Mandela's doing but, rather, a reflection of the ANC's ideological underpinnings. It is understandable, though, that given his larger-than-life personality, all manner of things will be ascribed to him in death, as was the case while he was alive.

He was, of course, his own man in many respects but, for completeness, it must be understood that he was also a 'party man'.

eGuerrilla: ^^^Great post.

Thanks bro.

I forgot to add one more leadership skill I learned: COMPROMISE

This is often seen as a bad thing but it is not. Nigeria would have turned out completely different if all leaders we've had since independence did some of that. Nigeria has been plagued by "winner takes all, win at all cost, do or die" political mindset since independence.

Mandela understood that you sometimess have to cede something in order to gain something.

Lesson learned: Quid pro quo is one of the biggest secrets of life.

@Onlytruth, Eze m, Where did you copy that info from? That is most definitely not your original material is it? dem say make animals wey get horns identify themselves, snail (Onlytruth) sef show up. Wonders shall never end.

Jokes aside, your posts here are quite cool.

ndu_chucks: @Onlytruth, Eze m, Where did you copy that info from? That is most definitely not your original material is it? dem say make animals wey get horns identify themselves, snail (Onlytruth) sef show up. Wonders shall never end.

Jokes aside, your posts here are quite cool.

They are entirely mine. If you doubt me, go and search google to see if you can come up with anything.
It is easy to see that I espouse most of Nelson Mandela's doctrine. I see myself in the man. As a young man he was a firebrand like me. He changed over time.

BTW Thanks for the compliment; I'd take it.

I just thought about what a Nelson Mandela would have done in Nigeria in January 1966, or July 1966 (assuming there was a party like ANC in Nigeria then). Maybe the war would not have been fought.

But what strikes me is that at every turn of events between 1960 and 1999, every national leader we've had only tried to swing Nigeria's fortunes towards his own tribe or region.

There are different African tribes in South Africa, but you hardly know this from outside. Mandela was a Xhosa (like Igbo in Nigeria), while the Zulu (like Hausa for argument sake) are the single biggest tribe in South Africa. However, despite the rise of the Inkhata freedom Party (IFP) the Zulu based party (propped by the departing apartheid regime), the ANC was still embraced by Zulus -Mandela helped make this possible. South Africa is a golden example of smooth African tribal coexistence, all thanks to Madiba.

Jarus would love this. Great post bruhh!

Great post.

Front page pls

eGuerrilla: @Onlytruth,

This is a great post.

If there is one quibble, here, it concerns the point you made about the death penalty. Like so many other decisions taken at the time, that was not simply Mandela's doing but, rather, a reflection of the ANC's ideological underpinnings. It is understandable, though, that given his larger-than-life personality, all manner of things will be ascribed to him in death, as was the case while he was alive.

He was, of course, his own man in many respects but, for completeness, it must be understood that he was also a 'party man'.

Yes, of course it was the position of the party which he led morally. At the heat of the argument then (post elections violence), he often said that had he been executed (rather than serving a jail term), the nation would have lost more, but that was a reason he gave to the "angry mob" in South Africa to help them grasp that death penalty was really a very bad idea.
I often wonder how many countries have thrown themselves into protracted civil wars and strifes just because they wanted to execute some people. Examples abound world wide.
When the first leader of Boko Haram was executed by security forces, I was here lamenting and shouting myself hoarse that it was a VERY BAD IDEA.
Well, here we are today.

Attempts to compare Nelson Mandela with ANY of Nigerian leaders so far will only sound very hollow, and incredible.

I recall that when Obasanjo was freed from prison, many Nigerians DESPERATELY wanted him to be the "Mandela of Nigeria".

Well, even some of the simplest of Mandela's leadership accomplishments like the "Truth and Reconciliation Commission" was too much for Obasanjo to pull off in Nigeria.
The Nigerian version quickly became a failure, again, because Obasanjo himself was only using it to consolidate his power.

Brimmie: Jarus would love this. Great post bruhh!

Thanks bro. I hope that Jarus would be drawn to comment here.

ACM10: Great post.

Front page pls

Thanks bro ACM10.

The Mods can decide what to do with the thread; it is their prerogrative.

@OP..,great post. I wonder why it didn't make front page

@OP

I do not think leadership qualities are found in a person who cow-towed to the dictates of more popular and stronger opponents to the tune of divorcing his wife who stood behind him and courageously carried on the wishes of her husband who was incarcerated.

DerideGull: @OP

I do not think leadership qualities are found in a person who cow-towed to the dictates of more popular and stronger opponents to the tune of divorcing his wife who stood behind him and courageously carried on the wishes of her husband who was incarcerated.

My brother you raised TWO issues with your comment: (1) That he bent to the opponent; (2) That he divorced his wife Winnie

For issue number one, I stated that he taught me COMPROMISE, and that people often see it as a bad thing but it is not.
Deeply embedded in understanding compromise is understanding the philosophy of TIME. There is time for everything under the sun, says the Bible.
When he came out of jail, the South Africa (and the world) he met were remarkably different from the one he left behind when he went to jail.
Remember that he refused to be released conditionally, and also negotiated terms of his release. I believe he would have stayed in jail if conditions remained as they were in 1963.

He had to LISTEN and WATCH -to OBSERVE AND ASSIMILATE new reality on the ground.

To me, that is one of the GENIUS of his leadership. Had he stuck to his old beliefs, he and the nation of South Africa could have lost everything.

On issue of divorce from his wife, it would be unfair to blame him (or his ex-wife Winnie for that matter); their marriage was destroyed by Nelson Mandela's prolonged absence from the life of his wife. Imagine a YOUNG girl having to waste 27 years of her prime sexual life waiting for her husband? Of course she "serviced herself". But where she went wrong was to continue servicing herself even when Nelson had come out of prison.
I believe that the man's life could have been threatened through Winnie's actions, so he like a true soldier saw danger and decided to distance from it. There were constant attempts at his life till he became president. He managed to endure till be could divorce her.

No matter how his life turned out finally, the man lived a very tragic life.

I'm trying my best to fix errors in my posts here.
Una know say English no be our first language.

Sincere 9gerian: @OP..,great post. I wonder why it didn't make front page

Thanks bro. It may still make the front page, it depends on how the Mods see it.

Good stuff. I love this — “Leadership isn’t a position, it’s a process.” And as for not taking ourselves too seriously… well, I trip over that one all the time.

I too hadn’t heard of him before. I like his philosophy about the ‘journey’. If we can be open to that mindset, it’s a great way to not try to hold on to what we think is success.