It is with deep sadness that we learn of the death of Mlamli Clarence Makwetu and offer condolences from the Chairman, Trustees and staff of the Nelson Mandela Foundation.
The former President of the Pan Africanist Congress, who died at the age of 88 on Friday 1 April, was held alongside Nelson Mandela in the B Section of Robben Island.
Although they were from rival political parties, Makwetu and Mandela lived side by side for seven years on Robben Island. They got along well in prison and outside.
In his speech at the signing of the post-apartheid constitution on 10 December 1996 Mandela mentioned Makwetu as one of the “good men and women” to be found “in all political parties.”
He added: “The duty of the real leaders of South Africa is to identify those good men and women in all these formations to create an environment where they can pool their talents, their knowledge, their skills, the expertise to pool it so that we can as South Africans, benefit from those skills.”
Speaking after his release about the relationship between the ANC and PAC in prison, Mandela said:
“We worked together very well … [and] when there was a crisis, we found it easy to come together and to work together and both members of the ANC and members of the PAC contributed to this working together”.
Makwetu served as a PAC MP in the first post-apartheid Parliament from 1994.
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