Impressions
of
Recently we
had a guided tour, crossing to the island by ferry and looking back on
We were
shown round the maximum security prison by a former political prisoner who
spoke eloquently of his experiences. He told us about the many petty and
demeaning regulations, for example how a prisoner’s classification as black or coloured determined his daily ration of sugar. Prisoners were
divided into different categories (A to D) with those in D category (like
Mandela) allowed to receive only 2 family visits per year, to receive 2 letters
per year and to send 2 letters (of 500 words) per year. All letters (incoming
and outgoing) were censored by the guards, who used scissors to cut out
anything deemed unsuitable. Sometimes the opening and closing greetings were
all that remained after censorship, which our guide described vividly as a form
of mental torture. It preyed on your mind that important family news was being
deliberately withheld. He said that once the prison governor had not told a man
that his father had died until it was too late for him to attend his funeral.
Mandela was not allowed to attend his mother’s funeral.
The cells
that had housed political prisoners were bleak. Each measured 2 x 2½ metres. Although I
could envisage these dimensions in the abstract, it still brought it home to me
to see Mandela’s cell and slops bucket and to imagine a man trying to sleep on
the concrete floor with only thin mats and few blankets. Through a barred
window one looked out on a courtyard surrounded by a high wall.
The
prisoners endured a harsh routine. Woken at 5.30, they slopped out at 6.45 before being given breakfast in
their cells. After an inspection they had to sit on the ground in the courtyard
and hammer stones until lunch at
Later
conditions eased, partly through protests by the prisoners themselves - refusal
to work, go-slows and, as a desperate last measure, hunger strikes - and partly
through mounting international pressure on the apartheid regime. They were
allowed to talk as they worked and, especially at meal times, the quarry became
a place of political discussion. Mandela conceived the idea of the prison
becoming a place of study, even a university. In the quarry they taught each
other. A basic aim was that nobody should leave unable to read and some guards
were glad to take advantage of these classes. Prisoners who behaved were
allowed to study in their cells, but such study was always a privilege, never a
right. Several prisoners gained university degrees through study on the island.
By the time that our guide was imprisoned (from 1986 to the early 1990’s when
the last political prisoners were released) the men were allowed to listen to
the radio, read newspapers and to play tennis and basketball.
After their
release many former political prisoners revisited the island together. Mandela
was the first to leave the quarry and, as he did so, he placed a stone on the
ground. Others followed suit and we saw the cairn of stones that was formed
that day, each one representing a prisoner who had probably laboured
there for years.
Warders too
were victims of the apartheid system and their lives were distorted by it. Some
of the warders were brutal, though our guide stressed that others had shown
humanity. Someone asked whether he was able to forgive his captors and the
police who had assaulted him, leaving a scar on his nose. “Yes”, he said, “I
have done.” As we walked to the ferry to return to
Our few
hours on the island were a most memorable and deeply moving experience.
Robin McLean
February 2003