Vendor
	Mohrbooks Literary Agency Sebastian Ritscher
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Politics & government

THE PLOT TO SAVE SOUTH AFRICA

Justice Malala

The Week Mandela Averted Civil War and Forged a New Nation

A riveting, kaleidoscopic account of nine tumultuous days, as the assassination of Nelson Mandela's protégé by a white supremacist threatens to derail South Africa's democratic transition and plunge the nation into civil war.

Johannesburg. Easter weekend. 1993. Nelson Mandela had been released from 27 years in prison and was in power sharing talks with President FW de Klerk. After decades of resistance, the apartheid regime seemed poised to fall... until a white supremacist shot and killed Mandela's popular protégé, Chris Hani, in a last, desperate attempt to provoke civil war. Twenty-two-year-old rookie journalist Justice Malala was one of the first people at the crime scene. And as he covered the growing chaos of the next nine days - the protests and police brutality, reprisal killings and arson and calls for paramilitary units to get combat-ready - he was terrified the assassin's plot might succeed. Thirty years on, Malala revisits the unforgettable events of these nine days. Unspooling political history in the style of a thriller, he alternates between the points of view of participants across the political spectrum - gleeful far-right provocateurs, devastated pro-democracy activists, recalcitrant government ministers, pleading pastors, astonished newscasters, and grieving, furious citizens in a riveting, kaleidoscopic account of a country on the brink. Through vivid archival research and shocking original interviews, Malala digs into questions that were never fully answered in all the tumult at the time: How involved were far-right elements within the South African government in inciting - or even planning - the assassination? And as the time bomb ticked on, how did Mandela, de Klerk, and their closest confidantes work together with opponents whose ideology they'd long abhorred to keep their country from descending into civil war? JJustice Malala is one of South Africa's foremost political commentators and the author of the #1 bestseller We Have Now Begun Our Descent: How to Stop South Africa Losing its Way. A longtime weekly columnist for The Times (South Africa), his work has also appeared in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, and Financial Times, among other outlets. The former publisher of The Sowetan and Sunday World, he now lives in New York.

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Book Published 2023-04-04 by Simon & Schuster

Comments

Magnificent, furious, nuanced, and un-put-downable. Malala steers us through the hatred, the grief, and the courage that shaped one nation-shaking week. The result is a searing thriller, a deeply moving work of investigative journalism, and a mesmerizing reminder of what leadership can achieve - and what South Africa almost squandered.

A widely reviled apartheid-era assassin in South Africa was stabbed by a fellow inmate on Tuesday, just days before he was scheduled to be released on parole, prison authorities said. The assassin, Janusz Walus, is often regarded as having brought South Africa to the brink of civil war during the tumultuous twilight era of apartheid in the 1990s for his killing of the charismatic anti-apartheid leader Chris Hani. Read more...

Heart-wrenching at times, Malala's immaculately researched account underscores the power of Mandela's great leadership in unimaginably difficult times... Relevant, compelling, and instructive.

Doggedly researched and immersively told, this is a fascinating study of a nation on the brink.

This is a dramatic work of history, prodigiously reported and beautifully crafted. Justice Malala is a first-rate storyteller, deftly weaving history with a narrative that reads like a novel. I couldn't put it down.

UK: Simon & Schuster UK ; ZAF: Jonathan Ball

A suspenseful nonfiction thriller featuring valuable firsthand observation.

Fast-paced, gripping, and expertly crafted, this book reads like a political thriller. A brilliant, moving, and extraordinary account of nine days that shaped a country and a continent, with the entire world looking on.

Journalist Malala examines how the 1993 assassination of one of Nelson Mandela's protégés by a white supremacist pushed South Africa to the brink of civil war just as apartheid was ending. Read more...