8000 days

Tony Heard, former Cape Times Editor, describes his decade in the Presidency as special adviser, and a dozen years elsewhere in government. He interacts with Presidents Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki, and joins their entourages on two unforgettable visits to the UK. He sees how Mandela sets about unifying the nation, managing to be conciliatory yet principled. He witnesses how Mbeki grapples with Zimbabwe's obdurate Robert Mugabe, and describes how Mbeki's perplexing stance on HIV/Aids puts the Presidency under heavy pressure. Heard describes a remarkable ambush in his office by an eccentric ex-Minister of Health, and a Presidency in ferment during historic events such as the extra-constitutional ousting of Mbeki. Heard is not one of the punditocracy. This is no academic treatise of second-hand history. In popular style, seeing humor as well as error and success, Heard tells what is was like working in the Presidency. He looks to a better future under Cyril Ramaphosa, after the wreckage left behind by Jacob Zuma.