Merriam-Webster defines a philanthropist as “one who makes an active effort to promote human welfare, a person who practices philanthropy” and defines philanthropy as “goodwill to fellow members of the human race, especially active effort to promote human welfare”. Nelson Mandela is often described as a philanthropist and a peacemaker. Because he dedicated 67 years of his life to fighting for human rights and the abolition of apartheid, he asked that people spend 67 minutes doing charity work on his birthday, 18 July. It has been 9 years since he passed and South Africans still do charity work on his birthday. His spirit of giving back lives on, one might even say that one of his legacies is philanthropy. His birthday is one of the first things I learned about him when I was in 4th grade. I remember being told that if it wasn’t for him, black people would probably not be free today. I saw him as the hero that we are often told he is, a peacemaker, a man who saved black people from white men, the perfect first black president. We were taught that he loves children, gives back, and that he is kind. Now that I’m older I do not believe some of the things we were taught about him. I now have a slightly different image of him. However, in 4th grade, I adored him and would have probably done anything to defend him and his legacy. This article is for her.
Nelson Mandela’s first home after he returned from Robben Island has been converted into a boutique hotel named Sanctuary Mandela. The hotel was officially opened in September 2021 and is being marketed as an institution that honours and preserves Mandela’s legacy. To get a room in this hotel you must be willing to pay between R4000 to R15,000, this raises a lot of questions. How is his legacy being preserved through such an expensive hotel? Which legacy is being preserved exactly? Who is the target market? Who stands to benefit from it?
I spent hours on the Internet looking for answers, but I couldn’t find any that satisfied me. The hotel’s website claims that “time spent at Sanctuary Mandela promises a sense of healing and reflection for all visitors… Sanctuary Mandela is now a re-envisioned residency, a one-of-a-kind boutique hotel with 9 curated rooms and retreat spaces for reflection, healing, and thought-provoking experiences inspired by the life and times of Nelson Mandela”. This promise left me with even more questions. What exactly are the people who are the target market supposed to be healing from? Apartheid? The aftermath of apartheid? If that’s the case then people who need to heal will most likely never set foot in Sanctuary Mandela, as they probably cannot even afford to buy data to go to its website to make a booking.
The hotel itself and the way it is being marketed makes me wonder if I ever knew anything about our first black president. If his legacy is being preserved through a luxury hotel that most black people might never be able to afford, then exactly what kind of a man was he? Why are people he spent his life fighting for denied the opportunity to “heal” in his first home? Why is the opportunity to experience Mandela through his first home only reserved for the rich? This hotel has taken one of the (arguably) few good things black people had left, a black hero. Turning Nelson Mandela’s home into a luxury hotel is disrespectful to him, his legacy and the people who were negatively impacted by apartheid.
Some members of the Mandela family are not happy about the way the Nelson Mandela foundation chose to honour Nelson Mandela. They believe that the NMF could have come up with a better way to preserve his legacy, and I agree with them. Since he spent his life fighting for human rights and starting organizations to promote his visions that mostly had to do with helping people, one would expect that his foundation would honour his legacy by promoting his vision. The hotel is not painting a picture of Nelson Mandela that was introduced to me in 4th grade. The man that is being honoured through the hotel seems a lot like the men Nelson Mandela was fighting against. They created institutions that, like the hotel, could not be accessed by black people. South Africa could use a bit of peace, justice, and philanthropy. Those are some of his legacies that the foundation could have drawn inspiration from to do something else with the house.
The luxury hotel in my opinion is not a good way to honour Mandela, it seems disingenuous and makes the NMF seem like one of the institutions that use Mandela’s name just to make money. The hotel capitalizes on black pain and trauma and disrespects Nelson Mandela’s legacy.