“Those who do not learn from history
are doomed to repeat it”
Cape Town – South Africa’s speaker of Parliament was in tears at the US Consulate General’s residence on Wednesday, as she compared US president-elect Barack Obama’s win to Nelson Mandela‘s historic victory.
“I got the same feeling most non-South Africans got in 1994,” said Gwen Mahlangu-Nkabinde, calling him “another Nelson Mandela”.
“If there is change in the US and hope in the US then there is hope for the entire world,” she told News24 moments after embracing her American friends.
A crowd of about 150 prominent South Africans and Americans living in Cape Town gathered at the residence in Bishopscourt at 05:00 to watch the election unfold.
1994 election ‘moved the world’
Mahlangu-Nkabinde, who was appointed Speaker in September this year, said that South Africa’s landmark election in 1994 had moved the entire world, much like the recent US election.
And Obama’s election was good news for South Africa, she said, not only because of his African roots, but because of his policies and beliefs.
“We will all embrace this change and assist where we can,” she said.
Others were also moved to tears as they watched Obama’s powerful acceptance speech on several big screens.
“I’m a basket case right now,” said an American professor, Seth Pollack. “Everybody back home is so inspired.”
He said his “conservative” mother had even threatened to move to South Africa if Obama didn’t win.
“I’m going to go cry some more,” he joked as he joined his wife in front of the screen.
Yes we can
Meanwhile, Democrats in South Africa had their own celebration in Johannesburg.
“The way in which Obama fought this election, not as a black man, but as an American desiring to unite the greatest nation on earth sends a very important message to every American citizen, every individual across the world and all world leaders,” Democrats Abroad chairperson R Courtney Priester said in a press release.
There are about 20 000 registered US citizens in South Africa and almost all voted in these elections, according to Priester.
He noted that Obama was assuming leadership at an extremely challenging time in US and global history. “But the impossible becomes possible when we work together. Can we conquer the challenges we face? Yes we can.”
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