Two individuals who unquestionably dominated the 2013 agenda were Nelson Mandela and Edward Snowden. Their treatment in the media could hardly have been more different. Yet, in many respects what they share is remarkable, and the fact that they brought out the best and the worst in humanity is no less so. Mandela's struggle against apartheid was remembered again after his death, and Snowden's baring of the worldwide intelligence colossus built by the United States stirred a much-needed debate on morality and the manipulation of the law in conducting mass surveillance and then justifying the practice by shifty arguments. Bradley Manning's disclosure of the US military's shocking conduct in Iraq and Afghanistan and his trial and sentencing were also of great importance in this regard. However, the spread of Snowden's revelations has been global, and their ramifications are going to be more profound and longer lasting. Mandela and Snowden are rebels from different generations — but both were classed as criminals as they took on the systems oppressing them. In going against regimes designed to serve the interests of the few at the cost of the vast majority, Mandela and Snowden both answered the call of higher duty beyond man-made legal measures which were unjust and unacceptable. To Mandela, South Africa's apartheid system, with all its consequences, was repugnant. To Snowden, the abuse of power involving the wholesale surveillance of citizens and world leaders was so wrong that for him it changed the game. The association of Mandela and Snowden with Moscow also establishes a remarkable similarity between the two men. Mandela's African National Congress (ANC) was supported by the former Soviet Union, and members of the South African Communist Party were members of the ANC. In the post-Soviet era, it was Moscow where Snowden found refuge, even as the administration of US President Barack Obama used all its power to have him captured and brought back to the United States. Mandela was lucky to escape the death penalty, instead receiving a life sentence in 1964 and spending more than a quarter of a century in harsh prison conditions. If Snowden had been returned to America, almost certainly he would have spent the rest of his life in jail — and it could have been worse for him. Radical and determined, the activities of these two men have been polarising at home and abroad. Feted by their admirers and reviled by their defamers, their actions raise very difficult questions, often only to receive glib responses. In confronting South Africa's stubborn racist regime after the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960 and the subsequent banning of the ANC, Mandela concluded that his movement had to abandon non-violence. He explained later that “when the oppressor — in addition to his repressive policies — uses violence against the oppressed, the oppressed have no alternative but to retaliate by similar forms of action.” Mandela had to go underground before he and other senior ANC leaders were captured, tried and sentenced. To escape a similar fate, especially after Manning's 35-year prison sentence, Snowden decided to leave the United States, ending up in Russia. To suggest that Snowden should have stayed in his country and justified his actions in US courts is either naïve or disingenuous. For the personal cost of such actions would have been very high, as Mandela and Manning both also found. There are people who will disagree with the very idea of finding a connection between these men despite the compelling similarities. It is always easy to admire someone who was once a rebel, highlighting what was wrong in society and furthering the cause of human consciousness, as long as all this happened a long time ago. The making of Mandela's image took decades. The sustained official vilification of Manning and Snowden now reminds us of the manner in which Mandela was treated by the South African authorities and Western governments, indeed by the media, at the time of his rebellion 50 years ago. All of which draws attention to the scramble among the world's most powerful leaders to be seen at Mandela's memorial and funeral, and to join in the adulation of his people, while these same leaders have been busy in the vilification of many of those regarded as heroes by the young of today. The oddity, in part, is due to their addiction to the television cameras, which have become an essential part of showbiz politics. There also exists a craving in these political leaders to preach to the world what they fail to practice themselves. Their desire to look good seems irresistible. However, the general loss of trust in public figures and institutions has been a consequence of it. The potency of their message of toleration and reconciliation to Africa would be more convincing if liberal and moral values were not under the pressure that they are in the West itself today. The long and arduous struggle of Mandela reflected the revolutionary spirit of his predecessors, one of whom was German revolutionary and American statesman Carl Schurz, whose words are appropriate here: “my country right or wrong. When right, to be kept right, when wrong to be put right.” Not missing the opportunity for reconciliation when it finally came was something that made Mandela great. It would be premature to compare Manning and Snowden with Mandela, for their struggles are current, and they have not been tested by time. Where they can be contrasted, favourably, with Nelson Mandela, however, is in their struggles for higher moral values which go beyond the narrow boundaries of nationalism and patriotism. The writer is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland.
