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About the Event:

Renowned South African political commentator and best-selling author Justice Malala recounts how the assassination of Nelson Mandela’s protégé by a white supremacist threatened to derail South Africa’s democratic transition and plunge the nation into civil war.

Johannesburg, Easter weekend, 1993. Nelson Mandela has been free for three years and is in power sharing talks with President FW de Klerk when a white supremacist shoots Mandela’s popular young heir apparent, Chris Hani, in hopes of igniting an all-out civil war. Will he succeed in plunging South Africa into chaos, safeguarding apartheid for perhaps years to come?

In The Plot to Save South Africa, Justice Malala recounts the gripping story of the next nine days, as the government and Mandela’s ANC seek desperately to restore the peace and root out just how far up into the country’s leadership the far-right plot goes. Told from the points of view of over a dozen characters on all sides of the conflict, Malala offers an illuminating look at successful leadership in action and a terrifying reminder of just how close a country we think of today as a model for racial reconciliation came to civil war.

Justice Malala’s new book The Plot to Save South Africa: The Week Mandela Averted Civil War and Forged a New Nation will be available for signing at the event.

About the Speaker:

Justice 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. Malala is also the former publisher of The Sowetan and Sunday World.