Sculptor Marco Cianfanelli's 50-column steel artwork of Mandela's face. The monument was erected where Nelson Mandela was arrested in Howick
Just outside Howick in the KZN Midlands stands one of the country's most striking monuments: 50 laser-cut steel columns that, from the right angle, resolve into the face of a young Nelson Mandela. It marks the exact spot where his 27-year journey to prison began.
On 5 August 1962, after 17 months evading the apartheid security police as "The Black Pimpernel," Mandela was driving past Howick disguised as a chauffeur, with activist Cecil Williams posing as his passenger. A car full of white men overtook them near Cedara. It was the police. Someone had tipped them off. Mandela was arrested on the spot and taken into custody that would last until his release in February 1990.
In Mandela’s autobiography, Long Walk To Freedom, he described the events leading up to his arrest.
“Cecil and I were engrossed in discussions of sabotage plans as we passed through Howick, 20 miles north-west of Pietermaritzburg.
