Rainbow nation

The phrase was elaborated upon by President Nelson Mandela in his first month of office, when he proclaimed: "Each of us is as intimately attached to the soil of this beautiful country as are the famous jacaranda trees of Pretoria and the mimosa trees of the bushveld – a rainbow nation at peace with itself and the world.

"[1] The term was intended to encapsulate the unity of multi-culturalism and the coming-together of people of many different nations, in a country once identified with the strict division of white and black under the Apartheid regime.

As a cleric, this metaphor drew upon the Old Testament story of Noah's Flood and its ensuing rainbow of peace.

"[4] It has been argued that rainbowism was associated with a unique, post-apartheid South African socio-political trajectory at the end of the 20th century, which initially contrasted with conventional post-colonialism.

Since then, the post-apartheid epoch and associated concepts such as rainbowism and nation building have been displaced by orthodox post-colonialism in South Africa.