If you believe Mandela took money from your country to fight for our freedom, then go and collect your money from Mandela and his family– South African Activist Sparks Debate

LUSAKA – A provocative statement by South African activist Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma, urging those who claim to have funded Nelson Mandela's anti-apartheid fight to 'go collect their money from Mandela's family,' has reverberated across the African continent, drawing sharp reactions and reigniting debates on historical contributions and pan-African solidarity. The remarks, initially made in South Africa, have found significant traction in Zambia, a nation with a proud history of supporting liberation movements. Ngobese-Zuma's comments come amidst persistent, albeit often unsubstantiated, claims by some individuals and groups in various African countries that their nations provided substantial financial aid to the African National Congress (ANC) and its leaders, including Mandela, during the struggle against apartheid. While Zambia, under founding President Dr. Kenneth Kaunda, undeniably played a pivotal role as a frontline state, offering sanctuary, logistical support, and political advocacy to numerous liberation movements, including the ANC, the precise nature and extent of financial contributions from individual states have often been a subject of historical interpretation and, at times, political rhetoric. Zambia's commitment to the anti-apartheid cause was not primarily financial in the transactional sense Ngobese-Zuma's statement implies. Instead, it was a profound sacrifice involving significant economic hardship due to retaliatory attacks from the apartheid regime, disruption of trade routes, and the strain of hosting thousands of refugees and freedom fighters. The country's infrastructure, economy, and social fabric bore the brunt of its principled stance, a cost that far outweighed any direct monetary contributions that might have been made. The activist's statement, therefore, touches a raw nerve, particularly in nations like Zambia, which viewed their support for the ANC as an ideological imperative rooted in pan-Africanism and the shared struggle for huma