South Africa: How SONA Was Used to Announce Mandela's Release

When apartheid negotiations reached a sensitive stage in the late 1980s, former President Nelson Mandela was taken to a hospital, where he was diagnosed with Tuberculosis. This was on 12 August 1988. Three months later, and after receiving treatment at two hospitals, the former statesman was then transferred to a house at Victor Verster Prison near Paarl, where he spent the last 14 months of his imprisonment.

Two years later, during the State of the Nation Address speech on 2 February 1990, the then President F W de Klerk announced that the banning of political parties - the ANC, PAC and the SACP, among other organisations, would be lifted. He also announced that politicians, including Mandela, who were imprisoned merely because they were members of the banned political parties, would be released.

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