06 Desember 2013

713

The minister stammered that he didn’t understand why the president was so upset, especially when it was he who gave the order to find Redeker.

The president threw his hands in the air and shouted that he never gave such an order, and then, from somewhere in the room, a faint voice said, “I did.”

He had been sitting against the back wall; now he stood, hunched over by age, and supported by canes, but with a spirit as strong and vital as it had ever been. The elder statesman, the father of our new democracy, the man whose birth name had been Rolihlahla, which some have translated simply into “Troublemaker.” As he stood, all others sat, all others except Paul Redeker. The old man locked eyes on him, smiled with that warm squint so famous the world over, and said, “Molo, mhlobo wam.” “Greetings, person of my region.” He walked slowly over to Paul, turned to the governing body of South Africa, then lifted the pages from the Afrikaner’s hand and said in a suddenly loud and youthful voice, “This plan will save our people.” Then, gesturing to Paul, he said, “This man will save our people.” And then came that moment, the one that historians will probably debate until the subject fades from memory. He embraced the white Afrikaner.

-Max Brooks, World War Z

He was a man, without whom, we would face a different world today. Perhaps a zombie apocalypse. Requiescat in pace, Madiba.

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