‘The Mandela Decade, the period of the 1990s, will be for generations to come a haunting turning point. It has been a privilege to have lived, thought and struggled through it,’ says author Ari Sitas. Sitas was a participant observer of the social changes addressed in this book. On 25 February 1990, hardly a week after Nelson Rolihlala Mandela’s release from prison, Sitas was there when Mandela told the 200 000-strong crowd at King’s Park Stadium in Durban to throw their guns into the sea. After five years of extreme violence and civil war in the province, what the majority expected was the arrival of a decisive and avenging Mandela. In the popular story-telling tradition, the release of the hero was to make the homesteads whole again, wrong would be made right, the shredded would be stitched again and the enemy routed.