Book Title: Shades of Difference, Mac Maharaj and the Struggle for South Africa
Author: Padraig O'Malley
Publisher: Penguin Books
Shades of Difference is a collaborative political biography, bringing together the author's scholarly insights, South Africa's liberation history and Mac Maharaj's own authoritative voice.
Mac Maharaj is a South African of Indian descent. For nearly four decades Maharaj played a pivotal role in the liberation movement, suffering brutal torture and twelve years' imprisonment in South Africa's most notorious prison, Robben Island. He was incarcerated with the international icon Nelson Mandela (Madiba). It is Maharaj who smuggled out the manuscript of Mandela's autobiography, 'Long Walk to Freedom'. After his release from Robben Island, Maharaj went into exile. He later re-entered South Africa clandestinely, to establish a political and military underground, on a mission so secret that only those at the highest echelons of the African National Congress (ANC) Mission in Exile were even aware of its existence. The mission was codenamed Operation Vula.
Mac Maharaj was born Sathyandranath Ragunanan on 22 April 1935 in Newcastle, a small coal-mining town in the province of KwaZulu-Natal.
The book is a labour of love and a scholarly achievement. It took eleven years of research and writing to complete. It draws on extensive interviews with Maharaj, a mountain of documentary evidence, archival material, and academic analysis. The result, is a vivid tale of bravery and resistance in the face of an uncompromising enemy - the apartheid regime.
Author Padraig O'Malley retraces the history of South Africa, dating back to the days of colonialism, the formation of the whites' only union of South Africa in 1910, the formation of the ANC in 1912, the politics of Mahatma Gandhi, Indian resistance, and the birth of apartheid in 1948. Simultaneously, it tells the life story of Mac Maharaj - his childhood, forays into adulthood, and ultimately politics. The reader is taken through the mundane details of Maharaj's childhood, education in Durban, exile in London, Germany, Lusaka, prison life on Robben Island, and the brave actions of a revolutionary - making of bombs, and smuggling weapons. It ends with a postscript on Maharaj's role in post-apartheid South Africa. He served on Mandela's cabinet as Minister of Transport.
The most interesting part of Padraig O'Malley writing is the recreation of the scenes where Mac Maharaj devised and implemented the plan to smuggle Mandela's autobiography out of Robben Island. Maharaj is credited with preserving Mandela's original voice - during incarceration he concealed Mandela's original manuscript and ultimately smuggled it out of Robben Island. He set about miniaturizing the text every night using point pen and pieces of A4 paper, full pages, on both sides. He rewrote Mandela's text, leaving one centimetre around the lines so that he could later cut it into strips for concealment. He was able to reduce ten pages of Madiba's writing onto one side of an A4 page. The entire miniaturized manuscript was concealed in folders and books. In preparation for Mac Maharaj's release, from Robben Island in late 1976, the prison warders packed his possessions, including his books and folders where the 'strips' of manuscript were concealed. It took more than two decades for the world to come face to face with Madiba's prison voice.
Shades of Difference: Mac Maharaj and the Struggle for South Africa is an important historical record - it documents decades of protests, violent conflict and ultimately the journey to peace. It is a political biography worth its 650 odd pages. Its greatest achievement is putting the pieces of Mac Maharaj's life in the context of their time and showing how these events shaped his life and vice versa.
Mac Maharaj has since been recalled from retirement. He is President Jacob Zuma's special envoy to Zimbabwe.
Bhekisisa Mncube is a qualified journalist and member of the Book Review Panel at the New Agenda academic journal in South Africa. Mncube is a former senior reporter (politics) at the Witness newspaper. He is also a columnist (Witness/Echo), his column 'On the High Road' appears on Thursdays.
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