Which of these leaders used both violent and nonviolent means to oppose apartheid in South Africa?

A. Kwame Nkrumah

B. Ho Chi Minh

C. F. W. de Klerk

D. Nelson Mandela

The correct answer is D. Nelson Mandela

A, and B are not even from South Africa while C is from South Africa but fought non-violently for equal rights. Nelson Mandela was accused of violent deeds as well as non-violent treason.

D. Nelson Mandela

As reported by the Los Angeles Times in regard to Mandela's willingness to use violent as well as non-violent approaches: "To many South Africans, particularly within the African National Congress, Mandela was a great man partly because of his willingness to use violence, not in spite of it. Many believe apartheid would have endured much longer if he hadn't rebelled and overturned the ANC's long-standing nonviolence policy."

Nelson Mandela was elected President of South Africa in 1994 after spending nearly 30 years in prison for challenging the country's policy of apartheid, or segregation. He had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 for his efforts in ending apartheid. In his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Mandela compared apartheid in South Africa with slavery that had existed in America. He said both essentially were the war of one people against another, of whites establishing their dominance over blacks by means of violence and exercises of power. White society and the political system that supported it could not have stayed in power over blacks without using violence and other means of oppression. When you understand his perspective that a war was already being perpetrated against blacks under apartheid, you can more readily understand his willingness to respond in ways that extended beyond peaceful protest.