MY DAY: PRISONER TO PRESIDENT

I finally found it! A framed picture reminding me of the moment, fashion show and the luncheon

The program from the Winnie Mandela visit to Dallas is dated January 24, 1992. The Ester Davis Collection (style, models, designers) was the “official host” at the St. John Family Life Center, alone with the Black Flight Attendants from American and Delta, under the direction of Lady Chadwick, the first black flight attendant to work the international flight circuit. Mrs. Winnie Mandela was here for several days under high security. The Red Carpet Treatment began with an ‘over-the-top’ public reception, hosted by the Honorable Al Lipscomb, former Dallas City Councilman, at the Convention Center, where the South Dallas Community Youth Choir sang. I never will forget and they will not either, the personal request from Mrs. Mandela to sing another song on the tightly woven program that evening. She stood as they sang.

Winnie and Nelson Mandela, both controversial activists, were married for 38 years. Nelson Mandela clearly and incontestably inspired the world. After twenty-eight (28) years of imprisonment for opposing the ruling apartheid regime, this man walks out on freedom with a smile, absolute forgiveness written all over his face. And that is not all. He votes for the first time. Wins the presidency and begins a legacy reign that includes non-whites in the political process. You have to seriously think about the audacity exclusion of a people from the political process in their own country.

So much about Nelson Mandela can be summed up as the “exceptional”. You can surely expect more to be written about the prisoner who became president. The long walk to freedom. The rhetoric will follow, but nothing can erase the fact that the prisoner was president. Genealogists, amateur and veteran writers, historians, scientists and self-appointed experts will continue to speculate, research and study the light, life and legacy of Nelson Mandela. The clear message across the ocean is that Africans and Africa Americans have to continue on the long walk to freedom. Remember ‘piece-a-way’ when you were a child? Nelson Mandela walked ‘piece-a-way’ with us. And I… am out of space.

Ester Davis can be reached at 214.376.9000.