Sunday's visit by President Barak Obama to Robben Island was very much to be welcomed. It was not the president's first - he was there in 2006 as a senator.  It was an opportunity for Mr Obama to show his children the prison that was home to Nelson Mandela for 18 long years.

Speaking at the University of Cape Town after the visit, the president explained what it had meant to his family: "I just had the honor of going to Robben Island with Michelle and our two daughters this afternoon.  And this was my second time; I had the chance to visit back in 2006.  But there was something different about bringing my children.  And Malia is now 15, Sasha is 12 -- and seeing them stand within the walls that once surrounded Nelson Mandela, I knew this was an experience that they would never forget." 

Now this is all well and good. And - given his frail health - it is hardly surprising that Mandela's prison cell was the centre-piece of the visit. Nor was it in any way inappropriate that the Obama family should have been shown round the island by Ahmed Kathrada, who was held there too.

What was disappointing was that there was no reference to the other political prisoners that spent so many years incarcerated off Cape Town. From the global coverage of the visit one would have been forgiven for thinking that just one man and one movement was imprisoned there. Everyone but Mandela and the African National Congress had been airbrushed out of history.

This matters less for South Africans, who know much more of their history. But whether one looks at the London Guardian or the Los Angeles Times, there is no mention of any other prisoner or party. The prison's history has been ‘captured' (see here and here).

Vanishing movements

The ANC has managed to monopolise Robben Island.

Yes, they were the majority of the political prisoners on the Island, but the Pan Africanist Congress was there too, as were prisoners from Black Consciousness, the African Resistance Movement, the Non-European Unity Movement, SWAPO and others.

These movements vanished from the reports. Even the South African Communist Party, of which Ahmed Kathrada was a member, joining its youth league he joined at the age of 12,  received no mention in the media. These groups, all of which played critical roles in fighting apartheid, are being erased from the historical record.

Missing resistance leaders

Where was any reference to Robert Sobukwe, the legendary leader of the Pan African Congress?

Where was any mention of Eddie Daniels, who spent 15 years on the island as a member of the African Resistance Movement, among the first organisations to take up armed struggle against apartheid?

These figures - and many like them - were denied any recognition in President Obama's itinerary.

Sadly it was no accident. As the old saying goes, to the victor, the spoils.

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