Heroine who became ‘Mugger of the Nation’

WINNIE Madikizela-Mandela has long been South Africa’s larger-than-life apartheid heroine, dubbed the “Mother of the Nation.”

But the 66-year-old firebrand, who was convicted yesterday along with her broker Addy Moolman of dozens of counts of fraud and theft, has rarely been far from controversy.

Revered and reviled in almost equal measure, her repeated run-ins with the law have left their mark on her reputation.

The former wife of Africa's most-respected statesman Nelson Mandela, Madikizela-Mandela was a fearsome opponent of the apartheid regime and firebrand leader of the African National Congress Women's League.

She campaigned tirelessly for the anti-apartheid struggle following her husband's arrest just six years after their 1958 marriage, and gained heroine status during her subsequent years of detention, banishment and arrest.

Apartheid ended in 1994. But Madikizela-Mandela's battles with the courts accompanied by tales of her taste for glamorous living kept her in the national spotlight.

Known as "Mother of the Nation" for her role in the freedom struggle, she was branded the "Mugger of the Nation" after revelations about the violent activities of her "Mandela United Football Club" group of enforcers.

She was convicted in 1991 of kidnapping and being an accessory to assault after the death of 14-year-old township activist Stompie Seipei, who was found near her home with his throat cut. Her six-year jail term was reduced on appeal to a fine.

Her reputation was further knocked when Mr Mandela sacked her from his newly-elected ANC government in 1995 and divorced her for adultery a year later. They had separated in 1992.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu accused her during public Truth and Reconciliation hearings in 1998 of gross human rights abuses.

Madikizela-Mandela was back in court in 2002, facing fraud and theft charges in relation to an elaborate bank loan scheme in which she was accused of participating with broker Addy Moolman.

While she dismissed the state's case as a "pack of lies", a Pretoria court convicted her yesterday, describing her defence that she was not told of the scheme as "highly improbable".

Detractors brand Madikizela-Mandela a troublemaker: she arrived late at rallies, missed meetings and was not shy about criticising her ANC colleagues, including President Thabo Mbeki.

In September 2001, they became embroiled in a public spat and a television camera caught Mr Mbeki brushing away Madikizela-Mandela and knocking off her hat after she arrived an hour late for a rally to commemorate the 1976 Soweto uprising.

But flamboyant Madikizela-Mandela, who described herself as a simple country girl, refused to be banished to the political wilderness.

She has launched a vigorous legal challenge against parliamentary attempts to censure her for breaking rules.

And unlike Mbeki, often criticised for his aloof presidential style, she is seen as having the common touch.

She attended the funeral of nine-year old AIDS sufferer and activist Nkosi Johnson, while Mr Mbeki, who has questioned the link between HIV and Aids, stayed away.

Born on September 26, 1936 in Bizana, Madikizela-Mandela, became politicised when working as social worker at a hospital.

"I started to realise the abject poverty under which most people were forced to live, the appalling conditions created by the inequalities of the system," she once said.