Johannesburg — Tributes poured in Tuesday for the South African anti-apartheid hero, Walter Sisulu, who died Monday night in the arms of his wife and fellow liberation activist, Albertina, at their Johannesburg home.
Sisulu was two weeks shy of his 91st birthday.
Nelson Mandela, 84, Sisulus friend and prison mate, called him a mentor and said his death had left a void in his life. Lamenting the loss of his "comrade" and confidant, Mandela wrote in a mournful statement: "Xhamela [Sisulus clan name] is no more. May he live forever! His absence has carved a void. A part of me is gone."
Sisulu recruited Mandela into the African National Congress (ANC), the movement that fought for and won the liberation of black South Africans from white minority rule. They jointly co-founded the militant ANC youth league with their colleague and late ANC leader, Oliver Tambo.
"During the past 62 years, our lives have been intertwined. We shared the joy of living and the pain," said Mandelas statement. "Together we shared ideas, forged common commitments. We walked side by side through the valley of death, nursing each others bruises, holding each other up when our steps faltered. Together we savoured the taste of freedom."
Albertina Sisulu, too distraught to talk to the media on Tuesday, had earlier described to the national broadcaster, SABC, that she had found a father figure in Sisulu. "I was very fortunate to marry a man like Walter, because Walter married an orphan. I had no mother and no father. So when I met Walter, it took me just a few months to understand he is not a husband to me. He is a father. He has taken my fathers place."
Mrs Sisulu said theirs had been a happy marriage, although her husband spent more than a quarter of a century in prison, away from their own five children and the four they adopted. "We never quarrelled ever since we got married. There was no quarrel in this house. He was just my guardian and he used to listen to me. He really was a wonderful man. He didnt have those qualities of men who feel big at times. No! Even when I was making a mistake, he would take time to make me understand that I had made a mistake. And I became shy and apologised. So thats the life we led. Up to this day, he was very sweet."
The Sisulu couple raised a family of anti-apartheid activists, spanning several generations, several of whom simultaneously served prison sentences during the struggle.
Although a towering figure of the liberation struggle, Sisulu with his trademark snow-white hair and black round-framed glasses, was quietly charismatic, gentle and publicity shy. A grandfather and great-grandfather several times over, Sisulu retired from active politics in 1994, the year Mandela was sworn in as the first black president of South Africa.
Mandela said Sisulu was never president of the ANC, nor a member of parliament. Nor, he added, did his friend receive accolades from foreign governments or win the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize. "Nevertheless, he stood head and shoulders above all of us. What was the reason for this? Because he had the gift of humility and simplicity. We have lost a remarkable man," Mandela told journalists at the Sisulu house on Tuesday.
President Thabo Mbeki, whose late father Govan was a close friend to both Sisulu and Mandela, announced that flags at all government offices would fly at half-mast from Wednesday, as a sign of mourning.
Mbeki told journalists he would ask the cabinet to organise a state funeral for Sisulu, who he described as "a giant of our people" and a "massive force for enlightenment and freedom" in South Africa. Echoing Mandelas praise, Mbeki said that many did not realise Sisulus importance because he was modest and humble. "Our country and people have lost one of our greatest sons, one of the architects of democracy, one of the architects of a non-racial society, of a non-sexist society," said Mbeki.
As well as Mbeki, a succession of senior government and ANC stalwarts, as well as black and white figures of the anti-apartheid struggle, friends and well-wishers offered their condolences to the Sisulu family in a continuing flow of visitors to their modest home in Linden, a Johannesburg suburb.
Many younger members of the ANC - including senior party officials, ministers and provincial premiers - have been reminiscing about the kind and thoughtful nature of Sisulu, who many considered their teacher and mentor - in and out of prison.
Deputy President Jacob Zuma, who was among the mourners on Tuesday, said Sisulu "has been an inspiration to us, particularly the younger generation,"' adding that "South Africa had lost "more than a leader, a father."
Defence Minister, Patrick Mosiuoa "Terror" Lekota, who spent years as a political prisoner on Robben Island with Sisulu, remembered that he was regarded with respect and awe when he taught the younger inmates the history of the liberation struggle. "To cultivate young people, to cultivate new freedom fighters, that was his distinguishing mark," said Lekota.
"By eradicating apartheid, we will be contributing to peace at home and to world peace. We dedicate our lives to this end," Sisulu said on his release from prison in 1989.
Walter Max Ulyate Sisulu was born to a poor Xhosa family in Transkei (now Eastern Cape Province) to a black mother and white father in 1912, the year the ANC was created. At 15, he left home for Johannesburg, working as a bakers assistant, a dairy worker and a gold miner, among other jobs. As a young factory labourer, he found himself taking up labour issues with employers and is reported to have developed the militant streak that led him into the ANC in 1940 and the liberation movement.
Along with Mandela and 154 other South Africans, from all races, Sisulu was charged with treason in 1956. They were all acquitted after a five year trial which failed to neutralise the ANC leadership.
But in 1963, he and others were arrested at the ANCs secret headquarters in Rivonia. After the landmark Rivonia treason trial, he and Mandela, among others, were convicted of plotting anti-government sabotage and were sent to Robben Island, the notorious island prison off Cape Town.
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The death penalty was expected but the judge handed down life sentences. For some this was thanks to international pressure surrounding the highly-publicised trial. But for George Bizos, one of four defence lawyers, Mandela and his fellow defendants had Sisulu to thank for the verdict.
Interviewed by the South African Broadcasting Corporation, Bizos recalled that Sisulu chose to take the stand at the Rivonia trial and, during cross-examination, devastated the prosecution. "The prosecutor made the mistake of taking him on, and he was hit for sixes, left, right and centre, by Walter Sisulu, by his knowledge of the facts, his belief in the justness of the struggle, his intelligence and his quick wit." The damage Sisulu did to the prosecution case, Bizos said, ensured that the Rivonia trialists got "life" instead of a death penalty.
Bizos said Sisulu should be remembered as "one of the top humanist heroes of the struggle" who "did very little for himself" and did "as much as he possibly could" for everyone else, especially his family. "That is his legacy. He was a real patriot. Younger politicians and younger leaders should take a page from his book, that service to the country was the primary objective."
Sisulu's death leaves Mandela as one of only a handful of influential ANC veterans who spearheaded the party's fight against apartheid. The former president's pain resonated in his tribute to his comrade "In a sense I feel cheated by Walter. If there be another life beyond this physical world, I would have loved to be there first, so that I could welcome him."
