‘WHAT I HAVE SEEN OF THE CAREER’ of Thabo Mbeki, a fantastically complex man of Africa, who was greatly haunted by the dream of her rebirth, and who took his presidency with grim seriousness, has given me an absolute faith (certainty) in my belief that his ‘Republicans’ did not find an empathy with him that enabled an immediate understanding – why this should be so can be fully understood by taking into account the fact that his style came in less obvious ways (it never fulfilled the function of reducing political risks, this style of Mbeki – by which I mean it was a high-stakes game). I retain a fascination for the protagonist, principally because he governed his ‘Republic’ as probably no other ‘Republican’ leader had done. In the perennial debate about Thabo Mbeki's style, I take a stand that he should best be remembered in six ways in particular: as a man of tradition, as a pragmatist, as a consensus-seeking leader, as a ‘modern president’, as an arch exponent of the dark arts of Realpolitik, and as a modern-style African nationalist (that is, a ‘hyphenate’ leader).