It’s Time to Call Out the Bull*hit From Right-Wingers Who Discredit Nelson Mandela’s Legacy.

Any right-wing extremist and white nationalist who assassinates Nelson Mandela’s legacy deserves to be ridiculed and humiliated.

Photo by Gregory Fullard on Unsplash.

Let’s be honest and direct: there is a growing, loud, and deeply dishonest movement — primarily on YouTube and in far-right political circles — that is working overtime to destroy the legacy of one of the greatest human beings who ever lived: Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela. These pundits, some of them coming straight out of South Africa and others from various Western countries, want you to believe you have been lied to about Mandela. They call him a terrorist. They call him a brutal man. They paint him as a villain. And yet — and here is the breathtaking hypocrisy — these are the very same people who have never once, not for a single moment, applied that same energy to calling out the Apartheid government and the violent, racist system it built and enforced for decades.

Enough. It is time to call out this bullsh*t for exactly what it is.

What Apartheid Actually Was — Let’s Not Forget.

Before we can talk about Mandela, we must talk about what he was fighting against, because that context is everything.

Apartheid — a word derived from the Afrikaans meaning “separateness” or “apartness” — was not simply a policy of racial preference. It was a system of institutionalized racial terror. When the National Party came to power in 1948, it began to radicalize and formalize race segregation and discrimination with dramatic effects on well-being and inequality. It was characterized by an authoritarian political culture that ensured South Africa was dominated politically, socially, and economically by the nation’s minority white population.

The Population Registration Act of 1950 classified South Africans as native (all Black Africans), Coloured/Colored (those of mixed race), or white, with an Asian (Indian and Pakistani) category later added. To our readers in the United States, Hungary, France, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Czechia, Croatia, Ukraine, Russia, Poland, Britain, Finland, Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, and beyond: please do not confuse the South African term “Coloured” with the deeply offensive slur that was — and in some places still is — used in your own countries to denigrate Black people and other minorities. In South Africa, “Coloured/Colored” referred specifically to multiracial, mixed-race people, and they, along with Black South Africans, Indians, Chinese, Koreans, and others, were subjected to the full brutality of apartheid law.

Other apartheid acts dictated where South Africans could live and work, the type of education they could receive, whether they could vote, who they could associate with, and which segregated public facilities they could use. Between 1960 and 1983, 3.5 million Black Africans were removed from their homes and forced into segregated neighborhoods as a result of apartheid legislation — some of the largest mass evictions in modern history. The Indemnity Act of 1961 made it legal for police officers to commit acts of violence, torture, or kill in the pursuit of official duties. The Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act (1949) and the Immorality Amendment Act (1950) prohibited interracial marriage or sex.

This was not governance. This was state-sponsored terrorism against the majority of a country’s own population.

And yet, the right-wingers who scream “terrorist” at Mandela have nothing to say about any of this. Not a word.

The Audacity of Calling Mandela a Terrorist.

Yes, Mandela co-founded the ANC’s armed wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (“Spear of the Nation”), after the government banned the ANC following the Sharpeville Massacre of 1960, when South African police opened fire on a crowd of anti-apartheid marchers, killing 69 people and wounding 186 others. At the founding of MK, the leadership — above all, Nelson Mandela — not only explicitly rejected terrorism as a strategy but was initially ambivalent about launching even a guerrilla warfare campaign. Mandela himself said plainly that the ANC’s armed struggle “was forced on us by the government.”

Even so, right-wingers and defenders of apartheid defamed and detested him as a terrorist. For years, politicians in the United Kingdom routinely denounced Mandela as a terrorist leader. In the United States, both President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher considered Mandela’s ANC a terrorist organization sympathetic to communism and supported its suppression. Mandela remained on the U.S. terrorism watch list until 2008 — eighteen years after his release from prison — a fact that U.S. senators themselves later called “an embarrassing impediment to improving US–South Africa relations.”

But here is the critical question these right-wingers never want to answer: What exactly was Mandela supposed to do? He and millions of Black, Coloured, Indian, Chinese, and Korean South Africans were being told they were inferior. They were being subjected to racial slurs — including the two variations of the N-word (Nigger/Negro) and the K-word (Kaffir) — being called baboons and savages, told they had no right to exist as equals, stripped of their citizenship, forcibly removed from their homes, denied education, denied the vote, and brutalized by a police state that had legal authority to torture and kill them. The ANC fought against apartheid for decades through rigorously nonviolent means — mostly labor strikes and public service boycotts — before the government’s escalating violence left them with no other option.

The right-wing position, stripped of its fancy language, is simply this: Black South Africans and other non-white South Africans should have kept quiet. They should have accepted the abuse, the humiliation, the slurs, the forced removals, the torture, the killings — and said nothing. That is not a political position. That is an endorsement of oppression.

Who Were the Real Terrorists?

Let us be very clear about who the real terrorists were in this story.

The National Party government made deliberate, calculated decisions to subjugate and segregate groups of people they deemed undesirable. They passed laws that legalized torture and killing by police. They forcibly displaced millions of people. They stripped people of citizenship based on race. They banned political parties, arrested activists, and ran a secret police apparatus that hunted down anyone who dared to resist. In the 1980s, with mounting internal and external pressures, the government became even more brutal.

That is terrorism. State terrorism. Systematic, legislated, government-sanctioned terrorism against the majority of a nation’s people.

And what did Mandela do when he was finally released after 27 years in prison? He came out not with vengeance, but with reconciliation. He renounced violence. He negotiated. He led South Africa to its first democratic election in 1994. He established the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to begin the healing process. He became, as scholars have noted, a liberation fighter who provided an antidote to the colonial ideology of racial profiling and hierarchization — and what distinguished him from other freedom fighters was his commitment to the cause of human rights, long before it attained its status as a constitutive part of global normative order.

Globally regarded as an icon of moral leadership, peace, democracy, and social justice, Mandela received more than 250 honors, including the Nobel Peace Prize. He is held in deep respect within South Africa, where he is often referred to by his Thembu clan name, Madiba, and described as the “Father of the Nation.” He is widely considered one of the greatest and most admired figures of the 20th century.

A Hero Not Just for South Africa — But for All of Humanity

Let us say this loudly and clearly, because it needs to be said: Nelson Mandela is not just a hero for South Africans. He is a hero for every Black person across the entire African continent and across the diaspora — from the Caribbean to Brazil, from the United States to the United Kingdom, from France to Australia. He is a symbol for every oppressed people on Earth who have ever been told that they are less than human, that their suffering does not matter, that they must simply endure. He proved that one person, armed with nothing but moral courage and an unbreakable will, could face down an entire machinery of state terror and win — not through hatred, but through dignity.

And he is not only a hero for Black people. He is a hero for all of humankind. For every person, regardless of race or nationality, who believes in justice, in equality, in the fundamental right of every human being to live free from oppression and humiliation. That is why he received more than 250 honors from nations and institutions worldwide. That is why, when he walked free from Victor Verster Prison on February 11, 1990, the entire world watched and wept. That is why, to this day, his name is invoked in every corner of the globe, wherever people are fighting for their freedom and dignity.

Now let us talk about these right-wing critics — these fragile, keyboard-warrior pundits who sit comfortably in their homes, filming videos and writing blog posts attacking a man who endured 27 years of imprisonment, forced labor, the destruction of his family, the torture of his wife, and the theft of his children’s childhoods — and still came out standing, still came out with grace, still came out choosing reconciliation over revenge. Let us be honest about what would happen if any of these right-wingers were subjected to even a fraction of what Nelson Mandela endured. They would not last. Not a week. Not a month. Certainly not 27 years. The same people who cannot handle being criticized on social media, who cry persecution when their views are challenged, who melt down over “cancel culture” — these are the people who want to lecture the world about the moral failings of a man who survived Robben Island with his humanity intact. The audacity is breathtaking.

Nelson Mandela was made of something these people will never understand because they have never been tested the way he was. He was not just a political leader. He was a monument to human endurance, moral strength, and the power of forgiveness. And no amount of YouTube videos, no number of right-wing think pieces, and no collection of bad-faith arguments will ever change that.

A Note on the Hypocrisy.

It is worth noting that even some who initially labeled Mandela a terrorist eventually had to reckon with the truth. When Mandela addressed Westminster Hall in the United Kingdom, the very Conservative Members of Parliament who had for years denounced him as a terrorist were sitting in the front rows. The world rejoices when a sinner repents — but let us not pretend the repentance erases the record.

The right-wingers on YouTube and in political circles today who are trying to relitigate Mandela’s legacy are not making a principled argument about violence or justice. They are making a racial argument. They believe that Black South Africans had no right to resist. They believe that the apartheid system, as brutal and as criminal as it was, should have been left intact. And they dress that belief up in the language of law and order and anti-communism to make it sound respectable.

It is not respectable. It is racism. And it deserves to be called out, ridiculed, and rejected — loudly and without apology.

Nelson Mandela’s legacy is not up for debate by those who never once questioned the legitimacy of the system he fought against. You do not get to call the man who resisted a terrorist state a terrorist while giving that terrorist state a pass. History has already rendered its verdict. Madiba was on the right side of it. The right-wingers attacking his name are not. And we are done pretending otherwise.

On a Personal Note.

I want to share something personal, because sometimes the most powerful arguments are not made with statistics or historical records — they are made with lived experience.

I lived in South Africa from September 1995 to May 1999. My parents were diplomats representing the Embassy of the Republic of the Congo in Pretoria. In the winter of 1997 — the summer of 1997, for those of you reading this in the Northern Hemisphere — President Nelson Mandela did something that I have never forgotten and never will. He invited all children of diplomats from around the world under the age of 16 to come to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to take memorable photos with him. Two of those children were my second-youngest sister, Laetitia, who was 12 at the time, and my youngest brother, Regis, who was just 8. I could not be in those pictures. Neither could my elder sister, Huguette. I was 16, and she was 17 — just over the age limit. And yes, I will admit it: that stung a little.

But what I will never forget is what Mandela said that day — to the parents, to the children, to the media gathered around him. He said that every child deserves the right to an education, irrespective of their background, their race, or their gender. He said that every child deserves to be loved, cared for, and prepared for the right future.

Now I want to ask the right-wingers, the white nationalists, and the YouTube pundits who call this man a terrorist a very simple question: Does that sound like a terrorist to you? Does that sound like a brutal man? Does that sound like someone whose legacy deserves to be dragged through the mud?

And let me take it further. Do you think Hamas would say that? Do you think Islamic Jihad would say that? Do you think any of the genuinely violent, extremist terrorist organizations — whether right-wing, far-left, or religious — would gather the children of the world at their seat of government and tell them they all deserve to be loved and educated, regardless of race or background? The answer is no. Absolutely not. So the next time someone wants to compare Nelson Mandela to a terrorist, they need to sit down, think very carefully about what they are saying, and then sit down again.

The man who invited my little sister and my little brother to take pictures with him at the Union Buildings — that man was not a terrorist. He was the embodiment of everything a true leader should be.

And my family’s connection to this history does not stop there. My mother worked alongside Winnie Mandela in the fight for women’s rights. Think about that for a moment — a Congolese diplomat’s wife, standing shoulder to shoulder with one of the most iconic women in African history, fighting for the dignity and rights of women in a country that was still finding its footing after decades of brutal oppression. My father met F.W. de Klerk — the last white president of South Africa, the man who ultimately released Mandela and negotiated the end of apartheid. And my father also spoke directly with Nelson Mandela himself. My father is a proud Black man who does not take nonsense from anyone. He did not need to be told what Mandela’s legacy meant. He lived it. He witnessed it firsthand. He stood in the same rooms as the men who shaped the history of an entire nation.

So when right-wing pundits who have never set foot in South Africa, who have never looked into the eyes of the people who survived apartheid, who have never spoken to the men and women who built the new South Africa from the rubble of institutionalized racism — when those people sit behind their microphones and their cameras and their keyboards and tell the world that Nelson Mandela was a terrorist, they are not just insulting Mandela. They are insulting every person who was there. They are insulting my family. They are insulting history itself.

To those people, I say this plainly: stop insulting our intelligence. And if your grievances against a man of Mandela’s moral stature are so deep and so consuming, do yourself a favor — see a doctor. Because what you are carrying is not political opinion. It is something far more pathetic than that.

The Bottom Line

Nelson Mandela’s legacy is not up for debate by those who never once questioned the legitimacy of the system he fought against. You do not get to call the man who resisted a terrorist state a terrorist while giving that terrorist state a pass. History has already rendered its verdict. Madiba was on the right side of it. The right-wingers attacking his name are not.

And we are done pretending otherwise.

About the author:

Roderick Balenda (also known as Rodrigue Balenda in French) is a French author of Congolese descent. A Danish citizen who identifies first and foremost as a Frenchman of Congolese heritage, Roderick has published hundreds of stories on Medium and continues to write political and cultural commentary on Substack. His work explores race, identity, and moral contradictions in modern politics.

Follow Roderick on: Medium: https://www.medium.com/@brnbalenda. Substack: https://substack.com/@roderickbalenda.

External links:

For the SerpentZA video specifically, I’d recommend searching directly on YouTube for “SerpentZA Nelson Mandela” to find the current URL, as the video may have been moved or retitled: “Watch SerpentZA (Winston Sterzel) — a South African YouTuber — attempt to rewrite Mandela’s legacy.”

On right-wingers defaming Mandela:

• IBW21 — How Right-Wingers Attempted to Defame Nelson Mandela As A Terrorist: https://ibw21.org/commentary/how-right-wingers-attempted-to-defame-nelson-mandela-as-a-terrorist/
• IBW21 — The Conservative Movement’s Long-Time Hate Affair With Nelson Mandela: https://ibw21.org/editors-choice/the-conservative-movements-long-time-hate-affair-with-nelson-mandela/
• Truthdig — Before Mandela Was a Hero, the Right Called Him a Terrorist: https://www.truthdig.com/articles/before-mandela-was-a-hero-the-right-called-him-a-terrorist/

On the terrorist label and watch list:

• Global News — Why anti-apartheid hero Nelson Mandela was once labelled a terrorist: https://globalnews.ca/news/5201623/nelson-mandela-apartheid-terrorist-south-africa/
• TIME — Why Nelson Mandela Was on Terror Watch Lists Until 2008: https://time.com/5338569/nelson-mandela-terror-list/

On apartheid itself:

• Britannica — Apartheid: https://www.britannica.com/topic/apartheid
• South African History Online — A History of Apartheid in South Africa: https://sahistory.org.za/article/history-apartheid-south-africa
• South African History Online — Changing Perceptions of Nelson Mandela: https://sahistory.org.za/article/changing-perceptions-nelson-mandela

On Mandela’s biography:

• Wikipedia — Nelson Mandela: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Mandela
• NPR Throughline — The Mandela Effect (podcast/transcript): https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1198908820