AP-Travel Online, October 27th, 2006
The Johannesburg airport has been officially named for the late anti-apartheid hero Oliver Tambo.
President Thabo Mbeki and former President Nelson Mandela presided over the formal ceremony renaming the country's main airport O.R. Tambo International Airport on the birthday of the late president of the African National Congress.
Mbeki said the airport now "carries the name of one who, rather than curse the darkness of oppression, lit the candles that led the way to a brighter future."
The renaming Friday was approved by the South African government in August despite criticism that it was a waste of money and would confuse passengers.
It was the third name change for the Johannesburg airport. It was originally named for Jan Smuts, the country's prime minister in World War II. The government made it Johannesburg International Airport in 1994, saying airport names should be politically neutral.
Since the end of white rule in 1994, South African authorities have been erasing names associated with apartheid from cities, streets and institutions. The ANC-led government has honored heroes of the struggle against apartheid, but some whites have complained the renaming robs them of a place in South Africa's history and heightens racial tensions.
Mbeki has argued Tambo is a unifying figure, but acknowledged Thursday that, "even today, not everybody in our country agrees that O.R. Tambo, this great son of our people, who did everything he did, including the sacrifices he made, in search of the happiness of all our people, both black and white, that he can or should serve as a such a national reference point."
Tambo was ANC leader in exile while Mandela was in prison. He earned huge international respect, winning support around the world for the anti-apartheid movement. He died of a stroke in 1993, one year before the country's first multiracial, democratic elections.
