Nelson Mandela would have opposed removal of British imperialist’s statue, says Oxford Uni head
NELSON Mandela would have opposed attempts to topple an imperialist's statue, an Oxford boss claimed today.
Thousands have demanded the university's Cecil Rhodes monument be removed as protestors chanted "take it down" during the city's Black Lives Matter protest on Tuesday evening.
But vice-chancellor Professor Louise Richardson insisted Mandela, who teamed up with a trust founded by Rhodes before his death in 2015, would not have "sought simplistic solutions to complex problems."
She told The Telegraph: "I think he was a man of deep nuance who recognised complex problems for what they were. And I don't think he sought simplistic solutions to complex problems.
"The question is, how do we judge people? How do you judge Cecil Rhodes? Do we judge him by our values today or do we judge him by the context of his time?
"I grew up in Ireland where Oliver Cromwell to me was what Voldemort [the Harry Potter villain] is to my children. And yet a statue of Cromwell stands outside Westminster. Does that mean it should be taken down? No.
"This is the stuff of academia. This is the stuff of universities. This is what education is all about. I don't think we can pretend our history is different from what it was."
It follows slave trader Edward Colston's statue being toppled at Bristol's Black Lives Matter protest on Sunday, raising fears that others including Winston Churchill's Parliament Square monument will face the same fate.
Protestors pulled Colston's statue down with rope before rolling it into the harbour while London demonstrators defaced Winston Churchill's statue accusing him of being "a racist."
In 2003 the South African statesman Mandela told Westminster Hall he would team up with a trust founded by Rhodes in order to build a "better future" for Africans.
Who was Cecil Rhodes?
Rhodes was one of the 19th century's most famous imperialists, helping colonise much of Southern Africa and having Rhodesia - now Zimbabwe - and Gambia named after him.
As Prime Minister of the Cape Colony from 1890 to 1896, his government restricted the rights of black Africans by setting financial qualifications for voting.
Rhodes was a student at Oriel, created Rhodes scholarships and gave money to the College.
He has now been accused of being racist and a British supremacist with growing calls for institutions to distance themselves from his legacy.
In his last testament he said: "I contend that we [the English] are the first race in the world, and that the more of the world we inhabit the better it is for the human race.
"I contend that every acre added to our territory means the birth of more of the English race who otherwise would not be brought into existence."
He referred to other parts of the world as inhabiting "the most despicable specimens of human beings."
The Rhodes Must Fall campaign ignited in 2015 at the University of Cape Town and soon won momentum from Oxford students demanding the fall the imperialist above the Oriel College entrance.
He died from heart failure in 1902, aged 48, at his seaside cottage in Muizenberg.
"In this, I am certain, Cecil John Rhodes and I would have made common cause," he said.
Professor Richardson added: "Those speeches by Mandela were extraordinary in their generosity. He said that we have to acknowledge our past but focus on the future.
"Hiding our history is not the route to enlightenment. We have to understand our history and we have to confront our history."
Oxford's chancellor Lord Patten said he had been present when Mandela signed the agreement to set up the Mandela Rhodes Foundation.
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He claimed Mandela said: "Cecil Rhodes, you and I are going to have to work together now."
Lord Patten told the BBC: "For me there is a bit of hypocrisy in Oxford taking money for 100 scholars a year, about a fifth of them from Africa, to come to Oxford, and then saying we want to throw the Rhodes statue in the Thames.
"For all the problems associated with Cecil Rhodes' history, if it was alright for Mandela then I have to say it's pretty well alright with me."