Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan and Senators David Norris and Jim Walsh send their apologies. Unfortunately, they are unable to be with us today.

In view of the fact that the proceedings are being carried live, I remind members, delegates and those in the Visitors Gallery to ensure their mobile phones are switched off completely for the duration of the meeting as they cause interference, even in silent mode, with the recording equipment in the committee rooms. Each week we receive complaints from the recording staff that the audio will not be clear if a mobile phone rings. I would appreciate it if everyone respected this instruction.

The item on today's agenda was unexpected - to express sympathy on the death of the former President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela. On behalf of the joint committee, I welcome the South African ambassador to Ireland, Mr. Jeremiah Dingaan Ndou. I am aware that the ambassador's term in Dublin will expire shortly and that this will be one of his final public events in the Oireachtas. As we bid farewell to Nelson Mandela, we also bid farewell to him and wish him well in his new position in Pretoria. I thank him for being with us for the past few years.

Nelson Mandela was blessed with a long life. He spent 27 long years incarcerated in a South African prison, but he achieved much as a civil rights activist and an anti-apartheid campaigner. He has left a legacy of inspiration to the people of South Africa and the civil rights movement throughout the world. He visited Ireland in July 1990 when he addressed the Dáil. He became the first black President of South Africa in 1994 and his success in unifying the nation won him international acclaim. He was also an advocate of conflict resolution. He believed very much in diplomacy and reconciliation and became an inspiration for all those striving for peace throughout the world. Rebuilding South Africa was a key priority for him during his presidency and afterwards.

Nelson Mandela recognised the healing power of sport and the very important role it would play in unifying his people and restoring his country's international reputation, having been ostracised from participation in international sports during the apartheid era. Most people remember his gesture of reconciliation when he donned the green Springboks jersey and baseball cap. I will always remember seeing the picture of him presenting the Rugby World Cup to François Pienaar in 1995. I also remember seeing him in Dublin during the Special Olympic Games in 2003. I will always remember the roar of the crowd when he appeared with the Special Olympians. It was only fitting that he made his final public appearance at the FIFA World Cup final in 2010. Sport was extremely important to him. He was a legend and will always be remembered. There will never again be anybody like him.

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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I am glad that the Chairman has arranged an opportunity for us to pay our respects to the late Nelson Mandela in the presence of the ambassador. Last week I met the ambassador and thought that would be our final meeting, but, unfortunately, the death of such an iconic figure has meant we are meeting again today. Our generation was very privileged to have witnessed the influence and positivity of such an international figure. Every year we learn of problems which can seem too much to confront, never mind overcome, but, thankfully, people of such stature as Mr. Mandela rise to these challenges. His enormous legacy will endure. President Obama referred to him as the great liberator of the 20th century.

Apartheid South Africa was a country in which there was enormous tension and which was challenged by particular difficulties. Nelson Mandela's leadership showed through and he was a constant calming influence. He was a leader with real vision and who put together the rainbow coalition which was generous and understanding of all. His achievements as President in a new political architecture were enormous. We are aware of the grave injustices under the the apartheid regime and they were well documented at the time. If modern communications technology was available between 1948 and the early 1990s, they would have been even better documented for the rest of the world.

I pay tribute to the 12 Dunnes Stores workers, 11 women and one man, and their campaign from 1984 to 1987. They took a direct stand against Nelson Mandela being condemned to hard labour in the desolation of Robben Island. They also campaigned against the injustices inflicted on so many South Africans. We should also note the Irish rugby players, many of whom were household names and revered in the world of rugby, who spurned the chance to tour South Africa with the Irish team. They showed real courage in so doing.

The ANC has shown real appreciation for the work of the Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement. Some of us were privileged to meet Kader Asmal while he taught in Trinity College Dublin and before he returned to South Africa. He was a constant and great advocate in dealing with the difficulties in South Africa. He always displayed real enthusiasm and determination in arguing that the issues had be addressed. I met him while he was at Trinity College Dublin and also in the South African Parliament when he Minister for Water Affairs and Forestry. It was a real privilege to know him and see him being able to return to his country to participate in government, having been a great advocate for the Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement.

Dan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael)
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I welcome the opportunity to offer my tribute to the life, work, bravery and success of Nelson Mandela and to say that people like him rarely present themselves to the world. One can think of Gandhi and possibly John F. Kennedy and Pope John XXIII who made a mark that will be there as long as humanity is existence on this planet. Nelson Mandela is one of those people. I have been to South Africa on several occasions and have also carried out voluntary work in Namibia and Zambia so I have seen at first hand the influence he had. The tributes being paid to him by the international community reflect his standing and presence in the world. South Africa was extremely lucky that somebody like Mandela came along when he did. Patriotism is often bandied about very easily. We talk about patriots but if we want to quote a real patriot to his country, Nelson Mandela surely fits that bill more than anyone else.

We saw the cruelty and injustice of apartheid in South Africa but we see it to some extent in many countries. It comes at different levels but one of the most extreme levels in my lifetime was surely that found in South Africa. We will not forget those who worked with Nelson Mandela. While he was the main contributor because he was the leader and chief who delivered justice where there was an unjust society, we should also remember those who were with him, supported him and died for what he believed in. I join my colleagues in remembering the Dunnes Stores strike because I was around when all that happened. Perhaps we would recognise as well what the Mandate union did at the time in deciding that a stand should be taken on apartheid in South Africa.

Nelson Mandela achieved freedom for his people at extreme cost to his own life. Few people I know have taken such a stand and devoted their lives. Perhaps it was sometimes easier to be executed for an issue than to spend 27 years in prison to ensure a positive outcome for his people. I join others in Fine Gael in paying tribute, as did the Taoiseach yesterday, to the life, work, presence and success of Nelson Mandela.

Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein)
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I welcome the South African ambassador, H.E. Azwindini Jeremiah Dingaan Ndou. I wish I had the eloquence to articulate or capture in words some of the essence of Nelson Mandela. Nelson Mandela, or simply "Madiba" or "Tata" to those who those knew him, sadly passed away last week. He was a man who dominated the end of the 20th century. He will be remembered across the world as one of the most remarkable, charismatic and principled leaders ever. Mandela first became politically active when he met Walter Sisulu, the ANC activist, while staying in the township in Johannesburg. He could have had a comfortable life with his family background and education but he could not sit idly by and watch the discrimination and State-sponsored oppression of the apartheid system. He was not prepared to live or be treated as a second-class citizen in his own land. It was on the occasion of Walter Sisulu's 90th birthday celebrations that Mandela said: "What counts in life is not the mere fact that we have lived. It is what difference we have made to the lives of others that will determine the significance of the life we lead."

Throughout the 1950s, Mandela continued to rise through the ranks of the ANC youth league and finally ended up on the ANC national executive. Mandela had become convinced with others that the use of violence was justified in the battle to bring down apartheid. He received military training in Ethiopia in 1962, learning how to use automatic rifles, pistols, mortars, bombs and mines, and was trained in sabotage. He also travelled to Algeria in 1962 to receive guerilla training in the last days of that country's war against its former colonial ruler France. He was arrested in South Africa in August 1962 and later sentenced to life in prison. Thirty-two years ago, Mandela was moved and influenced by Bobby Sands, as were many young people of my generation. When Bobby Sands died after 66 days on hunger strike, Mandela sent a message of solidarity and support from his prison cell on Robben Island on the day of Sands's funeral. ANC members were also in attendance in Belfast on that historic day. Prisoners on Robben Island were later to use the hunger strike weapon to successfully improve their prison conditions. I am also told that a copy of "Nor Meekly Serve My Time", a book written by three former blanket men, also holds a place of honour in Madiba's study.

During his 27 years in prison, Mandela became a symbol of hope for the majority of the oppressed people in South Africa and those who laboured for freedom, equality and democracy all over the world. His struggle and aptitude was so wide that when violence and the oppression of the white minority in South Africa were at their peak, the echo of protest could be heard half a world away in Dublin's Henry Street at the Dunnes Stores picket. I am embarrassed to say that I proudly stood in the picket and supported that cause because it is a bit like people talking about 1916 and those who were in the GPO but numbers of people turned up and we shared the firm belief that an injustice to one is an injustice to all.

Internationalism is important for every struggle. It brings recognition and allows the world to see injustice being carried out, but it also allows a sharing of experiences and success. While right-wing conservatives like Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan labelled him a terrorist and David Cameron took part in the young Tories' "Hang Mandela" campaign, common men and women were marching, protesting and agitating for his release and the dismantling of the brutal apartheid regime. That historic day came when Mandela was elected as South Africa's first black president in 1994. The moment filled the world with hope and optimism. The rainbow nation was born.

Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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I am representing the Labour Party. However, I must confess that I will need to blend my membership of the Labour Party with a personal chronology. As a 20 year old I left Ireland along with two colleagues. We hit Africa in late 1969. Travelling down through Africa to our ultimate destination of South Africa took six and a half months. This allowed us to absorb the magnificent culture of Africa because we travelled through so many diverse nations. The only country to which we were refused entry was Rhodesia at the Kariba dam. We duly went to Kasungula through Botswana and entered South Africa at Francistown. My political outlook was evolving and becoming clearer. We were treated in an overly friendly way by a white farming community in Francistown. I did not quite get it until later that the link was that they as Boers regarded us Irish as their heroes because our common enemy was England. I lived in South Africa during the apartheid era. Not only the South African experience but the experience of living in Africa for three to four years committed me to return to Ireland and to enter the world of politics. The horrors of the apartheid era in South Africa caused me to come back to Ireland and to become politically engaged and ultimately to join the Labour Party.

My time in South Africa was a very enlightening and not uneventful experience. I worked in Alexandra township. On the way from Johannesburg every morning it was not possible to see Alexandra township because it was covered in fog caused by the burning of cheap coal. People stood at the hosepipes to collect water. I spent some time there and then I went to the great leader's land of the Transkei where I spent six months. It is a most beautiful part of Africa. Everywhere we went we bonded with very good, decent, progressive Africans, Indians and coloureds. Mandela was a member of the Xhosa who have a magnificent clicking language. I remember the dancing of the women, the colour of the traditional dress and the round houses in the spectacular landscape.

I eventually moved on but I got in trouble with the security forces. BOSS was a very active intelligence agency and I am happy to say I paid a very small penalty by spending time in John Vorster Square. We are honouring the memory of the great leader of the ANC. I remind the audience that many political activists were incarcerated in John Vorster Square, some of whom were murdered. People like Imam Abdullah died in 1969, ostensibly by slipping on the stairs, and Ahmed Kamal died in 1971, ostensibly having fallen from a tenth floor window.

Nelson Mandela spent 27 years in a jail. As a white person I experienced the brutality of the white, mainly Boer, English-speaking Dutch Reformed Church. The treatment of the African community was hair-raising and frightening in its viciousness. The security people stopped people alighting from trains and incarcerated them or sent them back to where they came from. The vicious pass laws and apartheid destroyed families in Africa.

I am honouring the great leader because I could imagine I would be so embittered at the white regime if I were an African, an Asian or a coloured person that I would not have been able to restrain my people. I offer my greatest respect to the leader of the ANC, a man who managed to create the rainbow country which is today's South Africa. When we in Ireland look enviously at that country's economy and its economic growth, we see what he achieved in South Africa in such a short time. He was a man who was unparalleled in the world.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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Senator Norris and Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan are unable to attend this afternoon. Deputy Finian McGrath has been nominated to speak on behalf of Independent Members.

Finian McGrath (Dublin North Central, Independent)
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Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan sends her apologies. I represent the Independent Deputies and Senators. I welcome the ambassador. I offer my deepest sympathy to the family of Nelson Mandela and to the people of South Africa. His death was a very sad day for that country and also for the international community which held Nelson Mandela in such high regard. His name is associated with the attributes of courage, freedom, grace, dignity, humour and reconciliation. He has been a major influence on his own people but also on many Irish people, as previous speakers have said. I heard about the protests against apartheid when I was a young teenager and I learned about the situation in South Africa. In 1984, like my colleague, Deputy Seán Crowe, I am very proud to have been one of those people who joined the picketers. I worked in Dorset Street at the time and I used to come out every evening after school and do an hour or two on the picket line with the strikers. It was a very lonely place in 1984 and there was not a lot of support for them. A gang of us got together and we raised money for the Dunnes Stores strikers. The ambassador and the South African people acknowledged the role they played. The name of the shopworkers' trade union was IDATU. Two good friends of mine were involved in that union, Brendan Archibald and John Mitchell, who were instrumental in bringing that motion on boycotting South African goods through the union's national conference. Mandela inspired us all to fight discrimination, injustice and inequality. A group of people who grew up in Ireland were strongly influenced by him.

I express my appreciation of his role in and support for the Irish peace process. I also acknowledge the ambassador's strong support for the conflict resolution proposals to which Deputy Crowe referred. Mandela was one of the people who pushed for inclusive politics and he supported freedom, democracy and justice. He knew the hurt of isolation, and he knew the hurt of discrimination and the hurt of racism. We have witnessed sectarianism on this island. I thank the ambassador for his role and for the role played by Nelson Mandela in helping us to get out of a very bad mess. This has not been forgotten and is deeply appreciated.

President Obama and President Raul Castro shook hands at yesterday's funeral service.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy. I will suspend the meeting for five minutes and I want everyone to return straight after the vote, when the ambassador will respond.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I apologise to our guests for having to suspend the meeting because of a vote in the Dáil. I now invite the ambassador to respond to the comments and, perhaps, pay tribute himself to the great man about whom we have been speaking.

H.E. Azwindini Jeremiah Dingaan Ndou:

I thank the Chairman and the honourable members of the committee. On behalf of myself and the Government and people of South Africa, I wish to express our appreciation to the Chairman and members of the committee for organising this session to pay tribute to former President Nelson Mandela. We truly appreciate this effort and thank you deeply for keeping our young nation in their thoughts and prayers during this difficult time.

We also want to thank Ireland for the role it played during the anti-apartheid struggle. Many people here supported not only the campaign to release Mandela but the general struggle against apartheid. I thank the Irish Government for having agreed to establish a scholarship fund dedicated to bringing ten students every year to Ireland. This scholarship was named after Kader Asmal, who played a key role in mobilising and leading the anti-apartheid movement. We also appreciate the attendance of the delegation at the memorial service, which included the Dunnes Stores strikers.

Former President Mandela lives on as an international icon of the struggle against injustice which was conducted by millions of people across the globe. We have lost a great patriot and the world has lost an icon. Our beloved Madiba served our country and the world with distinguished dignity and we will forever remain indebted to him. He was a great, fearless and compassionate leader whose resilience and charisma made an impact on millions throughout his life. He cannot be replaced in person, but his legacy of selfless and principled dedication to equality and justice lives on in the minds of South Africans and of all the citizens of the world. He has left an indelible mark on our society. He dedicated his life to attaining justice for his people in South Africa, and long after his release from prison he continued to fight for human rights everywhere.

His legacy also lives on in South Africa's prudent micro-economic policies and sound fiscal management implemented during his reign as President of the Republic of South Africa. Under his leadership, South Africa implemented the reconstruction and development programme to address the immense socioeconomic challenges brought about by many years of apartheid. Almost 20 years after achieving democracy, South Africa is reaping the benefits of the solid foundations laid by former President Mandela's administration to deal with these challenges. Undoing the damage of the evil apartheid system in a short space of time was never going to be an easy task. However, the South African Government continues to work to pursue the ideas initiated by former President Mandela to try to deal with the challenges we face.

Next year marks the 20th year since we attained democracy in 1994, and we can proudly say that society has been transformed and that the process of transformation has continued in every sphere since then. Education levels are high and many millions of people now have access to basic services such as water, electricity and sanitation. This is all the more remarkable since many of these services have been achieved from a very low base in 1994. We have risen from the ashes of apartheid and stand proud on the world stage. Our voice and presence is keenly felt at institutions such as the United Nations and the African Union. We have not allowed our divided past to shape our future and together we have built a new society based on the values of a united, non-racial, non-sexist and democratic South Africa, an ideal that former President Mandela always cherished. There has been an increase of 47.5% in the number of households using electricity over the past 20 years.

This is a time to reflect on the strides we have made in achieving the vision of a better life for all - a vision that former President Mandela has always been passionate about. Undoubtedly, while much has changed, there are still challenges on which we must work. The legacy left by former President Mandela will endure and the challenges will continue to be pursued. We remain committed to forming a society based on equality, freedom and human dignity for all, as fought for by Nelson Mandela and others. Nelson Mandela's legacy lives on in our democratic dispensation, which he ushered in as the leader of the majority party. It lives on in the bill of rights enshrined in our constitution and adopted during his presidency.

Before I conclude, our thoughts are with Ms Graca Machel and the entire Mandela family as they mourn the loss of a husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather who meant a great deal to his family, his nation and the world. Our thoughts are also with the millions of South Africans and our friends around Ireland and the globe who are collectively mourning the passing of former President Mandela. We are deeply moved by the good wishes and expressions of support we continue to receive. He has left an indelible mark on our society.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I thank the ambassador for his thoughtful words. I shall summarise what has been said here today. Nelson Mandela showed the same graciousness to a democrat as an enemy and that sums up his life. I thank the Members and the ambassador for attending to pay tribute to this great hero. I ask Members to stand for a moment's silence in his memory.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I thank the ambassador. I ask him to convey our condolences to the Mandela family and the people of South Africa. In addition, I wish him well in his new appointment in Pretoria and hope that he continues to be a successful diplomat.

H.E. Azwindini Jeremiah Dingaan Ndou:

I thank the committee.

Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I thank him for joining us this afternoon. I know that he has a busy schedule at the embassy at this time and we appreciate the time that he has spent with us.