VALUE POINTS

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1. Military generals, with their chests bedecked with ribbons and medals from days gone by,
saluted him and pledged their loyalty.
Earlier they would have arrested him for having given a public speech as he was a black and
blacks in South Africa were discriminated and oppressed in the past.
2. To display equality between the two communities and respect for each other
3. (i) apartheid, oppression
(ii) freedom, equality, Nelson Mandela as the first African Black President
4. Courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who
does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear
5. Love

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1. In life, every man has twin obligations — obligations to his family, to his parents, to his wife
and children; and he has an obligation to his people, his community, his country
2. As a student, he thought of the transitory freedoms of being able to stay out at night, read
what he pleased and go where he chose. Later, as a young man in Johannesburg, he yearned
for the basic and honourable freedoms of achieving his potential, of earning his keep, of
marrying and having a family — the freedom not to be obstructed in a lawful life.
So as a boy, he thought he was given freedom. But as he grew up, he realised that not only
was he not free, but his brothers and sisters were not free. He saw that it was not just his
freedom that was curtailed, but the freedom of all blacks.
3. Mandela thought the oppressor is not free, he is the prisoner of hatred; he is locked behind
the bars of prejudice and narrow mindedness. He also needs to be freed from these shackles
just like the oppressed as both are equally robbed of their humanity.

1. To celebrate Mandela’s swearing in ceremony.

Triumph of democracy over apartheid
2. He is just the representative of the African freedom fighters who had sacrificed their
lives, like Oliver Tambos, Walter Sisulus, Chief Luthulis, Yusuf Dadoos, Bram Fischers,
Robert Sobukwes etc.
3. Yes, depths of oppression creates heights of character. More the oppression and
brutality, more united the people get to fight oppression and more strength of character
they reveal.
e.g. Hindus and Muslims fought unitedly against the British to make India free, though
now that unity is not seen.
5. It was his desire for the freedom of his people to live their lives with dignity and self-
respect that animated his life, that transformed a frightened young man into a bold one,
that drove a law-abiding attorney to become a criminal, that turned a family-loving
husband into a man without a home, that forced a life-loving man to live like a monk.