The Presidential Years

This chap Bright Chunga, an adviser to Kaunda with whom I was working in the context of the Peace Accord, told me that Madiba consulted Kaunda on this issue of the deputy presidency. And indeed it turned out to be true, because at the next meeting of the Officials, Madiba again asked the two to leave the meeting and he said: look I am now recommending that I be allowed to appoint Thabo, because I spoke to Nyerere and I spoke to Kaunda and both of them said, look, we now know Cyril but we don’t know him as much as we know Thabo, because whenever we needed to have sensitive confidential discussions with O R, he would always be with Thabo. Now, you were in jail for so many years, O R was running this organisation, we are sure that Thabo knows many things that were only known to O R which need to be known by the president. They strongly said, you don’t know the organisation, Thabo actually knows the organisation more than you do now. That was the basis on which he then said, no, I’m appointing Thabo.

Sydney Mufamadi