In the past week, South Africans have been marking the death of Prince Mangosutu Gajabutelezi,

Prime Minister of the Zulu Nation.

I'm Audrey Brown, and in this edition of the documentary from the BBC World Service,

I'll be looking back at the life and career of this controversial South African politician.

Alongside Nelson Mandela, Mangosutu Gajabutelezi was probably one of the best-known political figures

from South Africa in the 20th century, albeit for slightly different reasons,

whereas Nelson Mandela was revered for sacrificing his life to free all South Africans

from white political and social domination, Mangosutu Gajabutelezi's legacy is less clear cut.

He was known for opposing the apartheid government in the international arena,

but he was also accused of complicity with that very regime to further his own political influence

back home. First he was a family man, a father figure in his own family,

and beyond that he was a father to all of us and many whom he assisted to get education and jobs.

Wily, self-centered, charismatic, can be very petulant.

He wished to inscribe his own name into history in a very particular way.

He wanted to be remembered as the voice of those Zulu.

Shua Tempa, very articulate, very decisive, and did not suffer fools very easily.

He wanted to be an actor on the national stage, but at the same time he wanted to be firmly rooted

in that Zulu royal politics and his attentions in his politics, which of course are sustainable over time.

Mangosutu Gajabutelezi was born in 1928 in Mashabatini in what was then Natal, a province in the

Union of South Africa. He was born into Zulu royalty, his mother, a princess, his father,

chief of the Butelezi clan. Shalom Bata is a historian and expert on the Zulu royal family.

The Zula, the largest nation in South Africa, there is over 20 million of them,

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