Bring Me My Machine Gun The Battle for the Soul of South Africa, from Mandela to Zuma

Award-winning journalist Alec Russell was in South Africa to witness the fall of apartheid and the remarkable reconciliation of Nelson Mandela's rule; and returned in 2007-2008 to see Mandela's successor, Thabo Mbeki, fritter away the country's reputation. South Africa is now perched on a precipice, as it prepares to elect Jacob Zuma as presidentsignaling a potential slide back to the bad old days of post-colonial African leadership, and disaster for a country that was once the beacon of the continent.Drawing on his long relationships with all the key senior figures including Mandela, Mbeki, Desmond Tutu, and Zuma, and a host of South Africans he has known over the yearsincluding former activists turned billionaires and reactionary BoersAlec Russell'sBring Me My Machine Gunis a beautifully told and expertly researched account of South Africa's great tragedy: the tragedy of hope unfulfilled.

Alec Russell is World News Editor at the Financial Times, and formerly their Johannesburg bureau chief. He previously covered the wars in the former Yugoslavia and Africa for the Daily Telegraph and was its foreign editor from 2001–2003. From 2003–2006 he was based in Washington, D.C., and covered the Bush administration. He is the author of two books and lives in London.