Today, 18th July 2018, Nelson Mandela would have turned 100 years old.

Born as the First World War was grinding towards its painful end, he would epitomise throughout his life the very course for justice, human solidarity, peace, reconciliation and freedom which at the moment of his birth was denied his people and more than half the world’s population.

When he was born in 1918, the Union of South Africa was eight years into existence, characterised as it was by an exclusive all-white pact signed at the end of the South African War of 1899-1902, wrongly named for many decades the Anglo-Boer War, in order to deny the Africans their role and accordingly their rightful stake in the spoils of the war. The Union of South Africa would both unite the then four existing independent provinces of this broad polity under the dominion of the British Empire but do so on the basis of the political exclusion and economic exploitation of the black majority, the consequences remain a very real feature of our society even to this day.

From the outset, the black were viewed as outcasts in the new Union, but at worst they were regarded as the beasts of burden, there to be super-exploited and their labour power and its products to be expropriated at a pittance by a vicious system of white minority rule based on ferocious tyranny and violence. To underline this system of oppression, the white government had in 1913 enacted a law which expropriated all the land of the African majority by brute force, thus rendering every African household destitute truants in the land of their birth.

This Natives Land Act, which constituted the original sin in our country, added insult to the injury that had started with the discovery of diamond and gold in the Cape Colony and the Transvaal Republic which saw the various colonial governments introducing laws such as the poll tax, stock culling and others, added onto which now was the Land Act, all of which forced able-bodied African men from their rural homesteads, separated from their families to come and work on white farms and white-owned mines until the hands were bleeding and backs broken. 

Recording a crucial meeting they had had back in 1659 with the Khoisan leaders, Jan Van Riebeeck, who led the settlers who landed in the Cape of Good Hope on 06th April 1652, said the Khoisan leaders demanded their land for their cattle to graze, to which the settlers responded that “they had now lost that land in war, and therefore could not expect to get it back. It was our intention to keep it.” (John Reader, “AFRICA: A Biography of the Continent”)

It is not however my desire today to chronicle the entire spectre of the colonial economic relations but rather to give context to the conditions into which a young man was born on this day in a village of Mvezo in the Eastern Cape, unbeknown to him, his parents, family and fellow villagers that he would grow into a struggle icon of global stature. To become a freedom fighter would be Mandela’s destiny, one he would embark upon with a clear conscience.

On numerous occasions during his 67 years of struggle, he would reflect on his choice to be part of and lead the struggle of his people and, on each occasion, he came to the conclusion that he had made the correct choice. He knew the sacrifices his choices entailed, and that those opposed to his ideals would use every means at their disposal to thwart those ideals and try block the endless waves of the freedom struggle, and that in so doing they would not only use the most vile and vicious methods, but would seek to inflict upon their opponents and victims the most ferocious pain at a personal level.

But on none of the occasions when they visited such ferocity on his person and family did he even once flinch or flounder. Such was his tenacity that whenever he came face to face with the brutal regime of oppression, his principles triumphed and his steadfastness reigned supreme. He would never be the first to blink in the confrontation with the regime in the firm conviction and knowledge that to do so would betray his people and suffocate the vital courage they needed to make their principled stand against the tyrants.

It is my privilege today to stand on this rostrum to pay tribute to the memory of this icon about whom I am not so sure I am qualified to speak. What makes this occasion even more special is the very fact that gathered here are the representatives of the youth of the countries of the South Africa whose people have determined that they shall challenge the global status quo and ensure that the world in which we live is multipolar.

BRICS represents the global resolve of the peoples of developing nations that a new and better world is possible and with our collective effort we can forge such a world. With BRICS in existence, and growing stronger both as a trading partnership and political bloc, it will no longer be possible that the stronger will impose their will on the weaker and decide that the weaker or smaller shall lose their lands, economies and right to participate and be heard in global fora as it happened to the Khoisan in the 1650s.

The spirit of BRICS was captured by the first Indian Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, in 1947, when the proclaimed India’s independence and immediately cast his eyes on the global stage, saying: “And so we have to labour and to work, and work hard, to give reality to our dreams. Those dreams are for India, but they are also for the world, for all the nations and peoples are too closely knit together today for any one of them to imagine it can live apart.”

If the idea of being closely knit together existed already in 1947, how much more so today when globalisation has advanced so much and so far as it has, knitting together nations and peoples in ways yet before unimaginable! The countries and peoples that constitute the BRICS bloc are no strangers to one another; their relations were forged in the crucible of the struggle for independence and national self-determinations.

Each one of us and together have both struggled independently and also supported one another, forging common cause along the way, as we sought not only the right to national-determination for our peoples but also as we championed that for others. We come together not by chance or inescapable fate, but because our collective conscience and yearning for a new and better world has driven us closer to one another.

It is a special tribute to the South African people that as BRICS celebrates its first decade, it does so on our soil during the year of the centennial celebration of the birth of Nelson Mandela who belongs now to all BRICS nations and to the world.

A rare opportunity thus presents itself for your generation to reflect on the lives, the times and struggles of a rare generation, to ponder their feats and foibles, indeed in order not just capture the moments through which they traversed but, above it all, to examine the challenges of your time in relation to the lessons of their lives.

In one of his talks to us when we still members and leaders of the ANC Youth League, back in 1996, Nelson Mandela reminded us that when they formed the ANCYL, they commissioned three papers, the copies of which unfortunately can no longer be found today; namely,

The world we live in,

The country we live in, and

The future we want!

From the outset, it is discernible that Nelson Mandela and his fellow young comrades with whom they grabbed the mettle of struggle in the ANC determined to change not only the ANC and South Africa, but they cast their long eyes upon Africa and the world.

From the very onset, they were not merely national patriots, but were both African and international patriots, and that is why they did not limit the struggle for freedom in South Africa but both mobilised international support for it and ensured that in the pursuit of their own liberation, the South African people acted at all times in solidarity with other oppressed peoples of the world.

The ANC’s and South Africa’s abhorrence for injustice globally owes its origins from the example set by these pathfinders!

In honouring Nelson Mandela, we honour not only the individual, but also the group of young women and men with whom he sought to make history, in the course of which they charted for us difficult not to follow.

Because of these, the bright lights on our firmament, who lit our freedom struggle and whose sacrifices made the pain of our oppression bearable, because they imbued our national life with the hope that the gross injustice we experienced would in time come to pass, because of these, our struggle would gain international recognition and eventually become itself an internationalist struggle, and set an example in international solidarity.

We stand today as proud beneficiaries of these lodestars of our nation for whom our freedom meant more than their own lives. They risked and sacrificed it all so that we could stand today as a free people, free to pursue our destiny in conditions now of our own choosing!

In his unpublished prison autobiographical manuscripts, Madiba says, “Even when at times I am plagued with an uneasy conscience I have to acknowledge that my whole-hearted commitment to the liberation of our people gives meaning to life and yields for me a sense of national pride and real joy.”

When he thought about this, he was still in the underground prior both to the Treason and Rivonia trials, but he was already deep in the struggle having recently led the Defiance Campaign as the Volunteer-in-Chief.

Earlier, he had described how he had been torn by the prospects of being away from his family, knowing how that would affect them, because even though he had been confined to Johannesburg, pressure of work had allowed him little time to spend with them.

Probably at that stage, Madiba was not himself aware of the further drifting away and separation from his family he would have to endure as the demands of the underground and the preparations for the new phase of the struggle which would consist of the armed resistance would take their heavy toll on him and his comrades.

So heavy would be the sacrifices they had to make that in 1968 he would miss his mother’s funeral and in 1969 that of his son whilst incarcerated for life on Robben Island.

The heavy pain of being denied his duty both as a son and father to bury these two among the most invaluable in his life would excruciatingly haunt him inside the prison cells.

Those of us who are the beneficiaries of the precious gift of freedom which these freedom fighters bequeathed us may take for granted what they went through as they acted daily to demonstrate their commitment to our dignity and humanity.

With the passage of time, as democracy gets ensconced and we become more and more a rights-based society, we may lose the significance of the sacrifices they had to make and take for granted what they did as what they had no choice but to do.

Yes, they had no choice, because the heavy yoke of oppression was not only felt physically but it sat uncomfortably on the consciences of righteous women and men, black and white, young and old, and they could not reconcile their very being with its existence without challenging it and seeking its destruction.

Just to underscore this question of making hard choices in favour of justice and righteousness, in his letter to Amina Cachalia, Madiba reminisces about bidding farewell to his wife, the late Winnie, and kids at the end of the Treason Trial, saying:

“It was not an easy decision to make. I knew the hardship, misery and humiliation to which my absence would expose them. I have spent anxious moments thinking of them and never once doubted Zami’s [Winnie’s] courage and determination…”

But, he says later,

“And I sometimes used to think – search my soul – whether I had done the right thing, because not only my mother, but my sisters were struggling … I wondered whether I had done the right thing to try and help the public, and get your parents and family in such difficulties. But every time, I used to end up by saying, ‘Well, this was the correct decision on my part.’ … But one had to endure it, you see, because when I sat down to think about this, I said, ‘Well nevertheless, I have taken a decision, a correct decision’ because they are not the only people who are suffering. Hundreds, millions, in our country are suffering and so I felt I had taken a correct decision.”

Yet he and his comrades remained steadfast.

It is this steadfastness in pursuit of principles they considered so dear and which they cherished so completely that they were prepared to face any consequences to themselves in order to achieve them that we honour Tata Nelson Mandela and the women and men with whom they went to the trenches.

It is such courage that distinguished this rare generation of freedom fighters from the cowards that either oppressed them or that abstained from the freedom struggle for fear they could in the course lose their lives or apartheid-given petty privileges.

Earlier, in 1963, as their trial was nearing its conclusion, the Rivonia Trialists were anticipating maximum sentence.

First, they had refused to admit guilt during the trial and had instead accused the regime of being the one that was guilty and should have been on trial.

Secondly, they had agreed that if sentenced to death, they would not appeal.

This was both an act of courage on their part as it was a statement of faith in their people that they would not be cowered by the regime’s brutality to submission to oppression, but instead would be urged into action to avenge their death, should it happen. 

No statement uttered in the face of a probable execution has ever been more defiant than the one made by Madiba as the Rivonia Trial was being concluded, when on behalf of his fellow comrades he said:

“During my lifetime I have dedicated myself to this struggle of the African people. I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.”

In simple terms, at this moment they not only told the regime that they had no fear for it in their hearts, but they went further to dare it to do its damnest! Bear in mind that these men were husbands and fathers, and knew very well the full implications of their actions and the decisions they had taken. Yet, they remained steadfast and unflinching in the face of a probable calamitous end.

That famous Rivonia speech must not only have sent a cold shiver down the spines of the oppressed as they listened to some of their most principled leaders making their final stand against the racist bullies, but it also certainly shook racial tyranny to its roots, challenged their determination, if they had one, to execute these leaders and made them to recoil from their ignominious intentions.

As we reminisce about Nelson Mandela’s life, and what it means to your generation of youth, I am sure there is a lot in what I have already said above that you can extract and adjust to your conditions today.

However, I wish to say this to you that you who are free must never take your freedom for granted or believe naively that such freedom gained can never again be lost to new groups of tyrants.

Such tyrants do not need to be political, they could as well be economic tyrants arisen in the context of neo-liberal globalisation, or what has been termed market fundamentalism, which believes in the unbridled power of the markets, particularly of financial capital, and seeks to reduce the popular power and voice of the masses by turning them despondent and non-participants in the national and global political processes.

Gathered as you are today, being the youth and thus our future, you make an unequivocal claim to the future of your societies, the BRICS bloc and the world. You must resist all attempts to turn youth into idle observers of political processes who sheepishly accept the notion of youth apathy and abstain from the democratic process.

During this, the era and world of the most extensive availability of information and technology, you must insist that youth must be reached through the platforms in which they are most engaged and be involved through those processes.

That is why you must resist every attempt to exclude the youth from the political, civic and business processes particularly now when societies are getting younger and we have seen the emergence of younger political and corporate across the regions of the world.

In his book, The Price of Inequality, Joseph Stiglitz, former World Bank Vice-President, makes a bold statement that,

“We have seen how America’s current inequality, and that of many countries, did not arise spontaneously from abstract market forces but was shaped and enhanced by politics. Politics is the battleground for fights over how to divide a nation’s economic pie. It is a battle that the 1 percent (of the wealthiest) have been winning. That isn’t how it’s supposed to be in a democracy. 

You must take a stand!

History demands that you must take a stand; the present and the future also demand that you must take a firm stand to ensure that you transform our politics to be in favour of the excluded, the poor and to renew humanity’s faith in democracy.

Nelson Mandela and his fellow youth comrades could have been daunted by the ostensible might of the colonial government during the forties and decided not to form the ANCYL and join the ANC, in order to participate in the struggle for freedom, but so deep was their social conscience and so huge was their youthful exuberance that they could not sit idly whilst their people were oppressed, they joined in.

The BRICS youth must both to amplify the message of the BRICS bloc and to lend it youthful dynamism and vitality in ways that only the youth can because you, and you alone, are not inhibited by the complacency of the past but possess the wild and untamed ideals of the future!

The fundamental challenge for the BRICS youth is to seek a dynamic, inclusive, knowledge economy based on comparative advantage and value addition, increasingly integrated with global economies, as an equal partner.

You cannot stay away from the struggles for social justice and economic inclusion and participation for developing countries.

The globalisation of the eighties, nineties and the early 21st century was characterised by vast inequalities within and between nation-states, economic exclusion for large numbers of people, deepening poverty amidst unprecedented wealth for the few and the marginalisation of developing countries from structures of global political and economic governance and decision-making. 

It stands to reason that to reverse the above, there has to be a concerted effort by all developing countries to reject the global order that currently exists and demand and advocate for a new and better world order.

If Nelson Mandela were to wake up and ask the BRICS youth, are you content with the world order in which you live, you must give him an unequivocal answer that you seek social justice on a global scale.

To achieve that, you must get involved and participate, to demand a democratic system globally and nationally that solves poverty and achieves broad-based inclusion.

This means BRICS youth must advocate for economies, again to refer to Stiglitz, whose performance is judged by what is happening to the well-being of most citizens, rather than an elite few.

To create better societies and a better world, BRICS Youth through formal interactions like this Summit, and many more informal interactions, must find ways to collaborate and reinforce one another.

How to achieve this?

Empowerment of youth is a huge part of the answer; and youth are not empowered to succeed, countries themselves cannot succeed.

Preoccupation with the questions of the future – what it will be, how it shall be achieved and what social forces must be harnessed in its pursuit – accordingly places the youth at the very centre of every nation’s endeavours.

In essence, every society that neglects investing in its future – its own sustenance and survival – will inevitably meet its doom.

The sustenance and perpetuation of the ideas of any class and social stratum – indeed of any society – depends on the deliberate and conscious investment in the youth as the rising generation and their effective mobilisation into political action.

Youth are ideally suited to come up with new ways of thinking about and doing things.

They are typically the least wedded to the way things are, and the most imaginative, audacious and impatient about the way things might be.

Indeed, youth have always been instrumental in dramatic social progress, locally and globally and examples abound.

People in their twenties and thirties have been directly responsible for some of the most important turning points and periods of progress in our history and many are today transforming the economics of the world as well as the world’s most developed countries.

The pace of technological change and globalization has increased at dizzying speed.

Young people must lead our drive to advance, shape and win the fourth industrial revolution; they must point the way to the future and must be unafraid to propose bold ideas and tools with which to pursue them.

The challenge before all of us, and the challenge for you, is to build economies and societies which equip young people with the tools and ecosystems to create and take advantage of economic opportunities.

We need to fundamentally transform our economic patterns of production if we are to capture a share of global trade which is commensurate with our population.

This is a huge opportunity to use the BRICS partnership to reshape global trade patterns to accelerate and deepen our development.

Our education systems need to adapt to these changes and empower the youth for their current and future role to lead these dynamic societies and changes.

By 2050, Africa as a region will have one of the largest workforces in the world, with 1 billion young people. To dramatically scale up our education and training systems to cover this many young people, we will need to find innovative ways to deliver education. Education will need to become more interactive, to leverage technology and remote learning, and to become cheaper to deliver if we are to cover all our young people. We will need to get business heavily involved in shaping university and college curricula.

Certainly we will need to invest massively in teaching our young people STEM subjects and core 4th industrial revolution skills like software programming, coding and advanced manufacturing.

The economy needs to grow faster to create opportunities for the many young people who are unemployed, and who enter the workforce each year.  We need to resolve the political inertia, policy blockages and other factors which limit our economic competitiveness. We need new ideas and perspectives on how to advance growth and transformation.

BRICS youth need to participate in policy debates and policy formulation processes. You need to weigh in with your perspectives, experiences and proposals to influence the policies which will shape the economy.

In conclusion, you – the youth of BRICS – are not the leaders of tomorrow; you are the leaders of today.

Your deliberations at this summit matter. The connections you are making at this summit matter.

You are developing the policy ideas, the start-ups, the partnerships which will help our countries advance economically and socially now and in the years to come.

Daunting economic and social challenges should excite you; they are opportunities for you to have an impact.

On this Mandela Day, in the centennial year of our beloved first democratic President, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, I hope you will reflect on and embody the values of Madiba: commitment to building a just society, service to others, working every day to make the world a better place.

I thank you.