Nelson Mandela Legacy Sites

Nelson Mandela Legacy Sites, series of 14 sites across South Africa, recognized by UNESCO as part of its World Heritage List. The sites were chosen for their significance in the country’s long struggle for human rights and liberation that were denied under the South African government policy of apartheid, which sanctioned racial segregation and discrimination against nonwhites in the country for most of the latter half of the 20th century, and for their relevance to the spirit of reconciliation that guided the country’s transition from apartheid to a free, nonracial democracy. Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) is recognized for his significant efforts during the struggle as well as the transition. The sites include a home where Mandela lived as a boy and the university where he studied, along with other locations associated with South Africa’s broader struggle against apartheid. The 14 locations were collectively designated a World Heritage site in 2024.

Background

Mandela’s pivotal role in South African history is well known. He was a prominent antiapartheid activist who notably spent almost three decades incarcerated at various prisons for his use of guerrilla warfare and sabotage tactics to fight against the government’s discriminatory policies. His long period of incarceration began in the early 1960s and included an extended internment at the maximum security prison on Robben Island (1964–82); he was finally released, from Victor Verster Prison, in early 1990. Mandela was an active member of the African National Congress (ANC) liberation movement (later a political party), which he had joined in 1944. Over the years he served in various leadership positions in the organization, including having helped establish the ANC’s military wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (“Spear of the Nation”) in 1961, and serving as the ANC’s deputy president (1990–91) and president (1991–97). He was also the first Black president of South Africa, serving from 1994 to 1999. Mandela was a key figure in the collective efforts to bring an end to apartheid; transition the country into a peaceful, nonracial democracy; and foster a culture of reconciliation. Mandela and South African Pres. F.W. de Klerk were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1993 for their accomplishments in this process.

Mandela’s achievements have long been commemorated throughout South Africa. For instance, the house in Soweto where he had lived for much of his early adult life became a museum under the care of the Soweto Heritage Trust in 1997. After his death in 2013, a statue of him, nearly 30 feet (9 meters) high, was unveiled at the Union Buildings in Pretoria, where government offices are located. But for years, no sites specifically devoted to Mandela were part of the UNESCO World Heritage List.

This deficiency reflected a broader trend: African countries have generally been underrepresented in the World Heritage List, and many sites of historic significance on the continent have been physically neglected. The African World Heritage Fund was created in 2006, by the African Union and UNESCO, to address this problem.

At the July 2024 meeting of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, which was held in New Delhi, the South African delegation presented its nomination for a new collective property called Human Rights, Liberation, and Reconciliation: the Nelson Mandela Legacy Sites. It was approved on July 27.

The 14 sites

The collective of the Nelson Mandela Legacy Sites comprises 14 locations across four provinces. They were selected because they commemorate various aspects of South Africa’s liberation struggle—including the denial of human rights experienced by the nonwhite population during that time—that culminated in the end of apartheid in the early 1990s and the reconciliation efforts as the country transitioned into a free, nonracial democracy. The collective property also speaks to how South Africa’s experiences have impacted how others struggle for human rights around the world. Finally, it also honors Mandela’s significant role in the aforementioned transformation.

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  The Union Buildings, in Pretoria, Gauteng province. Located in South Africa’s capital, the Union Buildings were the site of Mandela’s inauguration in 1994 as South Africa’s first president elected by universal suffrage and the country’s first Black president. After his death in 2013, he lay in state at the site for three days, where more than 100,000 mourners waited in line to pay their respects.

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  Walter Sisulu Square, Kliptown, Soweto, in Gauteng province. This square is where the Congress of the People met to draft the Freedom Charter, a forerunner to South Africa’s current constitution, in 1955. The square is home to the Freedom Charter Monument, which commemorates the document.

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  Sharpeville Sites, in Gauteng province. There are four sites at Sharpeville that commemorate the 1960 Sharpeville massacre, in which police opened fire on a crowd of unarmed Black people who had come to protest the country’s apartheid laws. Amid the shooting, roughly 69 people were killed and more than 180 others wounded. Decades later, after apartheid ended, Mandela chose Sharpeville as the place where he signed into law the country’s new constitution. The four sites are the Sharpeville Police Station, which was the site of the massacre, the Sharpeville Memorial Garden, and two grave sites at Phelindaba Cemetery.
• Liliesleaf, in Rivonia, Gauteng province. Liliesleaf, a farm in Rivonia (located north of Johannesburg), was the secret headquarters of the ANC and other organizations involved in South Africa’s underground liberation movement from 1961 until 1963, when it was raided by police. Mandela lived there briefly.

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  16 June 1976 – The Streets of Orlando West, in Gauteng province. Orlando West High School was at the center of the Soweto Uprising, in June 1976, which started with Black students marching in the streets near the school to protest the government’s mandate that Afrikaans (a language associated with the white minority apartheid government) be used as a medium of instruction in schools. Several students were shot by police officers, and two—Hastings Ndlovu and Hector Pieterson—died; many others were killed in the aftermath. The site includes Kumalo Main Road and Vilakazi, Moema, and Pela streets.

• Constitution Hill, in Johannesburg, Gauteng province. This site is the home of a former prison complex and military fort. Many political prisoners were held there. Mandela was incarcerated there twice, in 1956 and 1962. The country’s Constitutional Court is also located on the Hill.

• Ohlange, in Inanda township, KwaZulu-Natal province. Ohlange High School was founded by author and educator John Langalibalele Dube as the Ohlange Institute. It is believed to be the first school in South Africa established by a Black person. It was also the venue where Mandela cast his vote in the country’s first election by universal suffrage in 1994.

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  University of Fort Hare, in Dikeni, Eastern Cape province. Founded as the South African Native College in 1916, this is South Africa’s oldest Black African university (though it now accepts non-Black students as well). Many prominent antiapartheid activists and South African leaders attended this institution, including Mandela, who studied there until he was expelled for his involvement in a political protest. The university later awarded him an honorary degree.
• University of Fort Hare: Z.K. Matthews House, in Eastern Cape province. Matthews (1901–68) was one of the University of Fort Hare’s first graduates, and he later became a professor there. He was one of the country’s most prominent academics and political activists and was one of the writers of the Freedom Charter.

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  Waaihoek Wesleyan Church, in Bloemfontein, Free State province. This is the site where the ANC (originally as the South African Native National Congress) was established in 1912.
• Great Place at Mqhekezweni, in Eastern Cape province. This is the home in Mqhekezweni village where young Mandela was raised by Jongintaba, the regent of Mandela’s Tembu clan, after the death of his father.