Mandela Capture Site

In August 1962 Nelson Mandela was captured on the R103 highway outside Howick in KwaZulu-Natal. He was returning to Lilieslief from a meeting with ANC President Chief Albert Luthuli and posing as a chauffeur. He had been on the run and living in hiding at Lilieslief and secretly had gone to visit his mother in Qunu. Afterwards he added on a few stops with ANC leaders in the area. Little did he know that his fellow comrades had all just been arrested in the raid on Lilieslief earlier that day. When they didn't catch Mandela as part of the raid, the police reacted to a tip-off on his whereabouts and caught him on the road back to Joburg.

You know by now what happened as a result of their capture and trial. Nelson Mandela and many of the others who were arrested that day served the next 27 years in prison.

There had been a memorial set up previously at the capture site, but this summer for the 50th anniversary of the capture, a new sculpture was erected. It is very cool!

When you first drive into the parking lot and pass the sculpture, it just looks like 50 black poles.













You enter the site through a satellite Apartheid Museum with displays and memorabilia on the history of Mandela, Lilieslief and the capture. Before you exit the building you pass the first of two tribute sites. Even though he was buried last weekend at Qunu and the 10 days of mourning are over, people are still dropping off flowers, gifts, cards and letters for their beloved Tata.






 

After you exit the museum, you next walk down a long and winding brick sidewalk which is supposed to represent Mandela's long walk to freedom. As you turn the last corner and start approaching the sculpture, the profile of Nelson Mandela slowly comes into focus.













If you stand here the focus is complete.
















The base of the sculpture has become another makeshift memorial.













 It is clear that the nation is still in mourning.

I have a feeling the flowers and tributes will never stop.