There were moments when I must say, because I was responsible for setting up peace structures within the ANC and for facilitating the interaction of our internal peace structures with counterpart structures on the other side, I must say there were moments when I would get worried before we went into government, because, with Madiba out of jail, victims of violence sometimes just went round to his house and confronted him with the helplessness that you would then feel – all he could do is to phone the police over whom we had no authority, phone De Klerk, and the victims were expecting relief, they were displaced from homes. That’s where we relied a great deal on NGOs like the SACC, trying to divert things, so that Madiba remained focused on the strategic issues.
But he was also feeling it. That is why sometimes you hear him speaking uncharacteristically, sometimes in anger, because he was feeling that his own integrity was on the line – he is talking to the other side, the other side is not showing seriousness in dealing with problems and he felt that it was like we were taken being taken for a ride
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