Shout Hallelujah, c'mon get happy

S'Thembiso Msomi: Let us celebrate, for a change.

At the risk of being ridiculed for being too sentimental, I suggest that we take a breather from all the condemnation and outrage of the last few days and actually rejoice at what we have managed to achieve over the past two decades.

Anyway, there can be nothing wrong with being in a sentimental mood, especially in February - the month of love and romance.

So, cast your eye away from the President's messy lovelife for a moment and take some time to appreciate the many victories we have scored during our long march towards becoming a truly united nation.

As the poet-MC Tumi reminded us in one of his hip-hop tunes, we should "never take for granted what Palestine has not had" - a sovereign state.

Just 20 years ago, we were in the same boat as the Palestinians - a people trapped in bloody political conflict with little hope of a permanent and peaceful solution.

February 1990 had begun with a glimpse of hope when the last apartheid president, FW de Klerk, announced the unbanning of all liberation movements and other organisations involved in resistance politics.

Tomorrow, we celebrate the 20th anniversary of Nelson Mandela's release from prison - an event that confirmed the country's unstoppable march towards non-racial nationhood.

Much has been said over the past two weeks about De Klerk's courageous February 2 1990 speech and the role his actions played in averting a "race war".

Rightly so, a lot more is going to be said over the next few days about Mandela's own role in all of this.

The two, as well as the teams they led, deserve all the praise they have been - and continue to be - showered with.

But a history that is only told from the perspective of "Big Men" is never a complete story.

None of what Mandela, De Klerk and other leaders achieved would have been possible without the approval and support of ordinary South Africans.

What would have happened had De Klerk's constituency rejected his endeavour and promptly replaced him with a more short-sighted politician like Andries Treurnicht? What if White South Africa had voted "no" in the 1992 referendum?

In the Palestinian-Israeli conflict we have seen how progress made at the negotiating table is often easily undermined by the actions of the electorate.

February 1990 and the negotiation process that ensued could also not have been possible were it not for the relentless pressure put on government by black South Africa and her local and international friends.

According to an SABC radio news bulletin, a spokesman for the FW de Klerk Foundation played down the role of sanctions in coercing the apartheid state to enter into talks with the ANC and other liberation movements.

But there can be no denying that the resistance movement was proving too massive for the state to crush it with brutal force as it had done throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Not that some elements within the state did not try to do so. The early 1990s were the most violent period in South Africa's history, and most of it was state sponsored.

As communities spent weekend after weekend burying neighbours slaughtered in what the then government liked to term "black-on-black violence", there was a real danger that - out of frustration and hopelessness - they would turn on Mandela and opt for an open warfare. There were still many politicians and activists who were sceptical of the talks led by Mandela and De Klerk; that they failed to win any significant backing is testament to the political maturity of ordinary people.

Post-apartheid South Africa is still far from perfect. We still have the most unequal society in the world, unemployment remains unacceptably high and crime continues to turn most of us into prisoners in our own homes.

But ours remains one of the most vibrant democracies in the southern hemisphere, if not the world.

One of the positives we can pick out from the otherwise shameful saga involving the president is that South Africans are indeed free to speak their minds without any fear of being victimised by the state.

When President Jacob Zuma stands before Parliament tomorrow to deliver his state of the nation address, he is expected to honour Mandela for his role in giving birth to this democracy.

We should also use the moment, to salute every ordinary South African for making it all possible.