Black History Month – Mandela’s visit to Glasgow October 1993 video

To celebrate October’s Black History Month, the Nelson Mandela Scottish Memorial Foundation is launching a short video to mark the anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s historic visit to Glasgow on 9 October 1993 to collect the Freedom of the City of Glasgow awarded to him in 1981 when he was still in prison. He also collected the Freedoms of eight other authorities, Midlothian, Aberdeen, Dundee, Newcastle, Hull, Sheffield, the London Borough of Greenwich and Islwyn.

In his acceptance speech, Mr Mandela famously said: “Whilst we were physically denied our freedom in the country of our birth, a city 6,000 miles away, and as renowned as Glasgow, declared us to be free.” Later he said that, while in prison: “it (the Freedom) made us realise that the world hadn’t forgotten us.”

Brian Filling, NMSMF Chair and Honorary Consul for South Africa in Scotland, said: “Nelson Mandela was a towering figure in Black history and it is important in Black History Month, and on the anniversary of his visit to Glasgow, that we remind people of his and the African National Congress’s struggle, and Scotland’s role in the fight against South Africa’s apartheid system, labelled by the United Nations as a crime against humanity.

“The apartheid system in South Africa was based on white supremacism and cheap black labour making vast profits for the West led and supported by Britain over decades”.

The six minute video will go online at 1pm on Saturday 9 October on the Foundation website at www.mandelascottishmemorial.org/9oct2021, Facebook www.facebook.com/MandelaScottishMemorial and YouTube https://youtu.be/tBo6v26ugjU It includes archive footage of Mr Mandela’s visit and a first-hand reminiscence from Michael Kelly, Lord Provost of Glasgow in 1981 when the Freedom was granted. Music comes from Ayrshire Fiddle Orchestra playing “Nelson Mandela’s Welcome to the City of Glasgow” by Blair Douglas.