The new South African leader was an apartheid hero - butsome haven’t forgiven his role in the deaths of 34 miners Cyril Ramaphosa will lead South Africa into the next decade,a formidable challenge for the anti-apartheid activist-turned-businessman. Ramaphosa, 65, is an activist lawyer who grew up in a poortownship in Johannesburg. He was detained twice in the 1970s for anti-apartheidactivities, Time says, and formed the National Union of Mineworkers in the1980s. Lenovo supportnumber The union leader then transformed himself into amulti-millionaire businessman, eventually taking over the McDonald’s franchisein South Africa in 2011, the BBC says. But Ramaphosa is better known in South Africa in connectionwith a massacre at the British-owned mining company Lonmin in 2012. Ramaphosawas a non-executive director when a wildcat strike at the Marikana platinummine ended with police shooting dead 34 strikers. He had called on the authoritiesto take “concomitant action” against the miners in the days before themassacre. During his testimony at an inquiry into the massacre he washeckled by protesters shouting “blood on his hands, Ramaphosa must go”, the BBCreported at the time. The South African news agency Business Live says that in a“bid to clear a major hurdle in his campaign for top office”, Ramaphosaapologised last year for the manner in which the Marikana massacre unfolded,saying he was “sorry for the type of language he used at the time”. “An inquiry subsequently absolved Ramaphosa of guilt. Butsome families of the victims still blame him for urging the authorities tointervene,” Reuters reports. The incident “rocked the mining industry and traumatisedSouth Africa”, The Daily Telegraph writes. Could Ramaphosa heal and restore South Africa’s politics andeconomy, in spite of his past? A country once described as the “miracle” of theAfrican continent is about to find out. |