Long Overdue: Clearing Nelson Mandela’s Record

New York Times

By The Editorial Board

April 9, 2008

Nelson Mandela needs a special waiver to visit the United States. In 2008.

You read that right. The former president of South Africa, an icon in the struggle against apartheid, cannot enter this country without special permission.

It’s a hold over from the past — and a travesty. Fortunately, Rep. Howard Berman of California, the new chairman of the House International Relations Committee, is trying to fix the problem.

He has introduced legislation that would remove from U.S. databases any notation that would characterize current and former members of South Africa’s African National Congress — the anti-apartheid organization that Mr. Mandela once headed — as terrorists. It’s long overdue. Click here to read the text of the bill.

South Africa’s apartheid regime banned the ANC in 1960 and its leaders were either imprisoned (like Mr. Mandela) or forced into exile. The organization engaged in armed struggle against apartheid for decades and was branded a terrorist group by both South Africa and the United States.

Apartheid eventually collapsed under the weight of internal and external pressure. In 1990, the ANC became a legal political party and four years later, it won a landslide general election victory and Mr. Mandela became South Africa’s first black president.

The United States no longer considers the ANC a terrorist group. But because it was designated as such by the South Africa’s long-discredited apartheid regime, its current and former members still show up on America’s travel and terrorism watch lists.

Until recently, State Department officials preferred to grant ANC members waivers for travel to the United States on a case-by-case basis. They feared a more permanent exemption would open the floodgates to similar requests by other former terrorist groups. But that objection apparently now has been wisely dropped.

As Mr. Berman has correctly observed: “The ANC sets an important example: It successfully made the change from armed struggle to peace. We should celebrate this transformation, and not continue a policy that is nearly two decades out of touch with reality.”