Mandela Day

I had the pleasure of Joining Professor Jake Gerwels (The chairman of the Nelson Mandela Children’s Foundation), and the Naspers staff at head office in Cape Town to pay tribute to Nelson Mandela on his birthday by taking up his challenge to give up of our time to make a difference in someone’s life.

Our challenge was to make as many sandwiches that we could in the allocated 67 minutes. In the end the team of over 100 of us produced just over 6000 sandwiches in the allotted time. If we had more ingredients, we would have made a lot more. All of the sandwiches were then distributed to different charities in Cape Town by the Foodcorp foundation.

I remember chatting to Prof Gerwels and asked a simple question that I think so many a South African asks, how can we carry over this feeling of goodwill and compassion to the needy on a daily basis, let it become a norm.

It was a simple but answer, but would take time to implement – we have to teach this to our youth, it has to be a core value and part of education. This was also echoed by Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu when he said we as South Africans have to become more charitable towards each other.

I remember at Nelson Mandela’s 90th Birthday when he said, “I am an old man now, its now in your hands”. It is so true, it’s now in our hands as South African to pick up from here and move this country forward – let’s Make a Difference.