Invictus - Carlin [16]
In the mini-South Africa that the island became, the black prisoners stood up to the white prison regime in much the way they had done to the government when they had been free. Civil disobedience was the general principle, and it expressed itself in hunger strikes, work go-slows, and a habit of salvaging every crumb of dignity they could. The prison guards whom Mandela met when he arrived on the island were accustomed to the prisoners addressing them as “baas.” Mandela refused and, while subject to intimidation, never budged.
Prison conditions on the little island fiefdom, formerly a leper colony and a lunatic asylum, were very much the expression of the personality of the commanding officer at any particular time. A mild and affable one called Van Aarde was replaced in 1970 by Colonel Piet Badenhorst, the most fearsome character Mandela would encounter during his years behind bars. The new recruits Badenhorst brought with him to the island were very nasty too, and between them they set about a reign of terror that lasted a year. Badenhorst was incapable of opening his mouth without swearing, and he made a habit at first of singling out Mandela for his filthiest abuse. His guards followed their master’s lead, jostling prisoners on their way to the quarry, submitting their cells to snap searches, and confiscating their cherished books, among which Shakespeare and the Greek classics were Mandela’s and Sisulu’s particular favorites. One day in May 1971 Badenhorst’s guards entered the political wing, B section, early one morning, quite drunk. They ordered the prisoners to strip naked while they searched their cells. An hour later one of the prisoners collapsed, and when another one remonstrated, and then hit out, he was beaten so badly that his cell was spattered in blood.
Mandela kept his cool, and under his guidance the prisoners again took up the lessons they had learned in their political struggle outside. They turned for help beyond their microcosmic island world. They sent out messages via prison visitors and the International Red Cross. Help was also at hand from South Africa’s most high-profile progressive politician in parliament, Helen Suzman, who visited the prisoners on the island, and was referred by them to Mandela, their unanimously elected spokesman.
The decisive moment came when three judges visited the prison toward the end of 1971. In the presence of Badenhorst, the three met with Mandela, who did not hold back from denouncing the harsh treatment the colonel had been meting out. He mentioned the sorry diet and the hard labor, but dwelled at length on the incident when the drunken guards had stripped the prisoners and beaten them. Badenhorst wagged his finger at Mandela and said, “Be careful, Mandela. If you talk about things you haven’t seen, you will get yourself into trouble, you know what I mean?” Mandela seized on Badenhorst’s mistake. Turning triumphantly to the judges, as if he were a lawyer in a courtroom again, he said, “Gentlemen, you see for yourselves the type of man we are dealing with as commanding officer. If he can threaten me here, in your presence, you can imagine what he does when you are not here.” One judge turned to the others and said, “The prisoner is quite right.”
Mandela had tamed his tormentor. After the judges left, prison conditions improved, and within three months word arrived that Badenhorst was to be transferred. But that was not the end of the story. The most interesting part was still to come, for it made an impact on Mandela that would help shape his attitude toward the Afrikaner “oppressors” for the rest of his life, and proved decisive when he was eventually allowed to join political battle