Johannesburg, May 12, 1993
Seeking to further globalise the recognition of outstanding individuals combatting social injustice, The Gleitsman Foundation is presenting African National Congress president Nelson Mandela with its second International Activist Award today at The Carlton Hotel in a ceremony and press conference. The award follows the Foundation's inaugural presentation in March to Chinese dissident Wei Jingsheng.
"There are few people who epitomise the power of activism more fully than Nelson Mandela," stated Foundation President Alan L. Gleitsman. "Having spent nearly three decades in prison in the overwhelming fight against apartheid, and with the fruition of his efforts so near, it is an appropriate time to honour the commitment of a man whose name has virtually become synonymous with equality and human rights."
Nelson Mandela has been an outspoken critic of South Africa's system of apartheid throughout his life. While still a law student he joined the African National Congress in 1944, co-founded the ANC Youth League and led peaceful campaigns against the country's discriminatory laws, such measures including the so-called "pass" laws. When the ANC was outlawed in 1960, Mandela, after sixteen years of non-violent protest, co-founded Umkhonto we Sizwe in 1961, an armed wing of the ANC. In 1962 he was arrested and sentenced to five years hard labour; two years later he was convicted on charges of sabotage and treason and sentenced to life imprisonment.
In February, 1990, President F.W. de Klerk released Mandela unconditionally. Mandela was elected president of the African National Congress in 1991.
Posthumous honours are being concurrently given to two women who fought for social and political change. Helen Joseph, a native of England, first become committed to the fight against apartheid after being stationed in South Africa during World War II. In four decades of work against oppression, she led "pass" demonstrations by women of all races, organized by the Federation of South African Women, spoke extensively against discrimination and conducted an 8,000-mile journey across South Africa documenting the unlawful imprisonment of native African leaders.
Petra Kelly, a native of Bavaria, became involved in the civil rights, women's and anti-Vietnam movements following her immigration to the U.S. in 1960. In the 70s and 80s she helped organise Germany's Green Party, served as a member of the German Parliament, played an active role in the European Nuclear Disarmament (END) process and organised the Green International Tribunal against first-strike nuclear weapons, which helped bring about the INF agreement and Soviet testing moratorium.
The Gleitsman Foundation International Activist Award, established by former business executive Alan L. Gleitsman, is presented to two outstanding individuals every other year. Winners must demonstrate exceptional perseverance, selflessness and leadership in striving to combat social injustice in their community, nation or the world. An international Board of Judges reviews nominations solicited on a worldwide basis and makes its decisions solely on the level of conviction, tenacity and impact demonstrated by the nominee.
In addition to a $100,000 award shared by both honourees, each recipient is given a sculpted image designed by Maya Lin, creator of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, DC.
Among those serving on The Board of Judges are former United Nations Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar, Nobel Peace Prize winners Aldolfo Perez Esquivel (1980) and Archbishop Desmond Tutu (1984), distinguished physicist and outspoken critic of China's authoritarian government Fang Lizhi and Alan L. Gleitsman. Also advising in the selection process are Jihan Sadat, widow of former Egyptian president Anwar Sadat; Walter Sisulu, Deputy President of the African National Congress; and Kerry Kennedy Cuomo, founder and executive director of The Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Centre for Human Rights, an organisation established in the memory of her father.
Honoured in absentia with The Gleitsman Foundation's first International Activist Award in March, Wei Jingsheng remains China's longest-held political prisoner and is near the end of a fifteen-year term in solitary confinement for his pro-democracy efforts. In 1989, a call for his release led to a massacre of protesters in Tiananmen Square. The International Activist Award, presented March 29 at The New York Academy of Sciences, was accepted
Issued on behalf of : THE GLEITSMAN FOUNDATION
Issued by : JEANNE BESTEBIER PUBLIC RELATIONS