Dear Comrade President Av Andre Odendaal

In his annual presidential address on 8 January 1986, ANC president Oliver Tambo called on South Africans to make apartheid ungovernable through armed action and militant struggle. But unknown to the world, on that very day, the quiet-spoken mathematics teacher and aspirant priest turned reluctant revolutionary had also set up a secret think tank in Lusaka, which he named the Constitution Committee, giving it an ‘ad hoc unique exercise’ that had ‘no precedent in the history of the movement’. Knowing that all wars end at a negotiating table, and judging the balance of forces to be moving in favour of the liberation movement, Tambo wanted the ANC to hold the initiative after the fall of apartheid. Assisted by Pallo Jordan, he instructed his new think tank to formulate the principles and draft the outlines of a constitution that could unite South Africa when the time came to talk in the fledgling days of freedom and democracy. The seven-member team, including Albie Sachs, Kader Asmal and