An “old man without power and position”, came to speak to delegates on the first night of the Congress. That was how cde Madiba described himself to the 3000 delegates to Cosatu’s 8th Congress.But judging by the rousing welcome, the standing ovation, the whistling and the incessant clapping that delegates gave the “˜old man’, that was not the way that they view Madiba.The welcome seemed almost too much for cde Madiba. Looking at the sea of red that faced him, he seemed at a loss for words. But slowly his smile spread across his face, his eyes lit up and he greeted delegates: “Don’t rest on your laurels,” he warned them, “you must work hard,” if you are to achieve what you want.Describing unemployment as the biggest challenge facing workers, he said that job creation was the greatest need currently.Commending Cosatu for its stand on HIV/Aids, he challenged delegates to fight the HIV/Aids battle as “committed fighters as you were in the struggle against apartheid and exploitation.”Calling HIV/Aids a war against humanity, he gave a personal account of how the stigma attached to it is killing just as many people as the disease is. While on a visit to the Limpompo Province, a family told him about their neighbours who had died of Aids leaving three children under eight years old to fend for themselves. The family he was visiting, proudly told him that they were “˜helping’ the orphaned children with food. He soon found out that “˜helping’ meant putting food into a plastic container, shouting for the children and throwing it next door! Madiba then went and spoke to the children in their house for 30 minutes. “When I wanted to join my colleagues, I walked fast to join them but they almost ran away! Many people are killed by that stigma that they are not human beings. We must destroy that! By stigmatising them, we condemn them to death.”One Cde Bethuel Matekane quietly said, “I wonder if cde Madiba’s parents were still alive what would they be saying when they see this living legend of the people.”
by Cedric Gina, Mirriam Makhalamele and Jenny Grice