Unleashing the Tiger

PRESIDENT NELSON MANDELA takes his chances after being warned by former president PW Botha not to "unleash the tiger of Afrikaner nationalism" in this ZAPIRO cartoon, which perfectly captures the relationship between the two adversaries. Botha was responding to the murder trial of apartheid general Magnus Malan. Secretary for Safety and Security Azhar Cachalia replied by saying that "all of this talk about awakening wild tigers is from people who are living in a theme park from the past".

At the time The Mail & Guardian wrote: "Minutes after PW Botha this week warned Nelson Mandela against waking the tiger of Afrikaner nationalism, a brown tabby cat wandered into the press conference and began rubbing itself affectionately against the legs of assembled journalists. The incident served to underscore the president's view that threats of a right-wing backlash over the Magnus Malan murder trial are exaggerated and that it is best to leave the justice system unhindered to deal with a more serious threat - escalating hit-squad violence in KwaZulu-Natal."

No doubt the tabby cat incident served to inspire the original cartoon, which has been coloured here for Zapiro's book 'The Mandela Files'.