Rewriting history in wake of Mandela’s death
For decades UK leaders and US leaders supported the racist regime in South Africa and supplied it with weapons, making huge profits. Recently House of Commons speaker John Bercow said Mandela was “Father of us all”, yet in 1989 he was chair of the Federation of Conservative students which produced “hang Mandela” posters and badges.
David Cameron also praised Mandela, yet in 1989 he went on an all expenses fact-finding trip to South Africa in secret whilst Mandela was in jail. Margaret Thatcher and president Regan classed Mandela and his ANC as terrorists and opposed sanctions against white South Africa. Even last week former Tory chairman Lord Tebbit was refusing to back down from saying the ANC was a “typical terrorist organisation”. Ex-Tory MP Terry Dicks went further and compared Mr Mandela to a member of Al-Qaeda. Not until the very end of the eighties did public opinion backed by boycotts of South African companies and goods help bring the regime to its knees.