Johannesburg - From a vegetable patch created on Robben Island in the 1970s to a spectacular red king protea in the 2000s, Nelson Mandela’s long association with vegetables and flowers reminds everyone of our enduring and important link to plants.
Even before his Robben Island days, “Mandela had acquired some experience of gardening from his time at Clarkesbury Institute and tending the garden at Liliesleaf Farm, Rivonia,” writes Oxford University Professor Elleke Boehmer in her book Nelson Mandela, A Brief Insight (Sterling Publishers, 2008).
Helping in Rev Harris’s garden at Clarkesbury “planted in me a lifelong love of growing vegetables”, Mandela said in his autobiography, Long Walk To Freedom.
In the mid-1970s, Mandela and Umkhonto we Sizwe commander Laloo Chiba were given permission to garden a strip of open ground at the far end of the Robben Island prison yard, at right angles to the Section B corridor. “Mandela began to measure beds and weigh and grind compost,” writes Boehmer.
“The garden was to be productive, not merely decorative: it would grow nutritious vegetables for the prisoners.”
Warders supplied seeds and soon the garden was a full-scale operation. “By late 1975, Mandela, Chiba and their helpers had raised 2 000 chillies, 1 000 tomatoes and two watermelons, as well as peppers and cucumbers,” recalled Boehmer.
“A garden was one of the few things in prison that one could control,” added Mandela in his autobiography. “To plant a seed, watch it grow, to tend it and then harvest it, offered a simple but enduring satisfaction. The sense of being the custodian of this small patch of earth offered a small taste of freedom.”
After 18 years on Robben Island, Mandela was moved to Pollsmoor Prison in 1982. “The shift to the cells on the concrete roof of Pollsmoor Prison interrupted, but did not curtail Mandela’s gardening activities,” writes Boehmer. “He undertook to relieve the rooftop’s gray monotony by creating a garden in the sky using 16 44-gallon oil drums sawn in half, into which he poured soil carted from the prison’s own market garden.
“Mandela obsessively watched over the development of the eventual 900 plants, helped by his Rivonia colleagues.
“Warders, including the prison commander, supplied seeds and assisted with erecting hessian barriers against the wind.”
Pollsmoor warder James Gregory recalled: “Eventually, at the height of the growing season, there was a huge variety of plants in the vegetable section: eggplants, cabbage, beans, spinach, carrots, cucumbers, onions, broccoli, lettuce, tomatoes of a number of varieties… and many types of spices.”
Moved to the deputy governor’s cottage at Victor Verster in 1988, Mandela was given a garden for his sole use during the final two years of his imprisonment. The garden’s perimeter wall was raised to screen his activities and on the day of his release (February 2, 1990) he took time out to show his family and friends the vegetables and flowers he had cultivated, before taking his famous walk to freedom.
In the past few decades, hundreds of parks across the world have been named in Mandela’s honour and in 1980, a three-hectare Nelson Mandela Forest was planted with 2 400 trees and 120 indigenous species alongside his home at Qunu.
Mandela became a patron of the South African Floral Union in 1995 and a number of individual plants have been named in his honour:
Strelitzia reginae Mandela’s Gold: In 1996, the National Botanical Institute (now South African National Biodiversity Institute) renamed a rare and spectacular yellow form of strelitzia reginae, in his honour.
First released in 1994 as Kirstenbosch Gold, the plant was identified during the 1970s by Kirstenbosch curator John Winter. Today, Mandela’s Gold is found in most large garden centres.
Rosa Madiba: In 1996, the Madiba rose was released by Ludwig’s Roses. A fragrant hybrid tea rose, it grows to a height of 1.5m to 1.8m with long-pointed buds of a deep maroon-pink. As the rose develops, it changes to a deep lilac.
Red king protea (Protea cyneroides Madiba): In the mid-2000s, a striking, deep red king protea cultivar was named Madiba. Flowering from August to October, it is moderately tolerant to heavy soils, but does best in sandy soils and full sun.
Orchid Paravanda Nelson Mandela: This was named to honour Nelson Mandela on his visit to the Singapore National Orchid Garden on March 5, 1997.
Madiba has often spoken the words of a popular Sotho saying, Moaha moriti ha adule, plant trees for others. - Saturday Star