Nelson Mandela is dead.

Great shame. Did an enormous amount to re-unite a fractured country.

I speak to an awful lot of South Africans through work and understand the reverence they held him in.

RIP.

R.I.P.

RIP

Lived the sort of life you read about in the Bible.

An inspiration for ALL people.

What an amazing life...what an amazing Man.........

Worry for S Africa now he's gone......He seemed the glue that held it together.......

Tragic stuff..........End of an era............

RIP Madiba!

We knew this day was coming over the last 6 months, but still very painful.

A legend of mankind and we South Africans have to ensure all his hard work is continued and never forgotten.

Dearest Madiba we've lost you today, but your immortal soul will never leave us.

RIP beloved Madiba. A once in a generation man. A legend who dedicated his life to achieving an impossible dream, bringing peace to a nation.
He will never be forgotten. He leaves behind an inspirational legacy. A man who taught us all how to be heroes.

TRUSSMAN66 wrote:What an amazing life...what an amazing Man.........

Worry for S Africa now he's gone......He seemed the glue that held it together.......

Tragic stuff..........End of an era............

Why the doom and gloom comment?

SA could have ended up in civil war years ago but compassion and forgiveness prevailed.

We all know SA has some serous problems but hopefully the passing of Mandela can pose as a positive in their society. Fearing for the future is pointless.

Rip great man. God grant you the peace you achieved for so many others

Great Man in the lineage of Gandhi, Mandela is an inspiration to all humans.

May Gods of all Religions rejoice and accept in Heavens a giant of a Man, Nelson Mandela.

SA will be forever in his debt.

Yeah, I'm not sure that Mandela was/is the glue that held S.A. together. No doubt there are a few crackpot far right and far left, who will think that Mandela's death now means that bedlam is nigh, but I would be surprised if a nation breaks down because of the death of a man who hasn't been in the public eye for nearly a decade.

Now, for the man himself. Like all great people/things, there is the man, and the legend. The legend is great, but the story behind the man is simply remarkable. Haven't heard of one person who spent time with the man who isnt/wasn't in awe. I'm a firm believer that true greatness is thrust upon a person. In a normal society, Mandela would have been a 6'4 aspiring world heavyweight champion, indeed he often said he's greatest regret was not being able to fight for the world title. Unfortunately, he wasn't born into a normal society, and thus made a change in ways that many will never forget. South Africans don't do mourning. We celebrate life and this is possibly the greatest South African life, going to be raucous during the day of his funeral.

May the man rest in peace. And may we as South Africans continue to work towards the dream.

Listening to NPR in the US, a short bit about Mandela was mentioned. He was instrumental in convincing Libyans to give up Megrahi (of the PanAm 103 notoriety) who ended up in a Scottish prison. Mandela visited him in the prison and when asked by the reporters, he said that he could not wash his hands and walk away. He himself, being an unjust prisoner, empathized with another, guilty or not, knowing what he [Mandela] had been through in another prison. It made my eyes well up, part happiness, part sadness.

What a wonderful human being Mandela was!

If the continent of his birth would be inspired by him, CAR and Rawanda, Burundi, Liberia,  Angola and Sudan and many a tragedy could have been avoided.

Problem is that Mandela is a genuine freak outlier. When the country was on the brink of a civil war, Mandela took it upon himself and in a speech where he basically told anyone who isn't ready to be a part of the new S.A. to take a walk, he basically changed the direction of a country. I've always wondered as to how arrogant a man must be to think that a speech from him will be enough to avoid a civil war... then I invariably wonder about just how great, charismatic, and talismanic he has to be to actually succeed.

For him to persevere in a life marred by unending personal tragedy, is a triumph of the soul which, much as he may have downplayed it, cannot possibly be overstated.

kingraf wrote:Problem is that Mandela is a genuine freak outlier. When the country was on the brink of a civil war, Mandela took it upon himself and in a speech where he basically told anyone who isn't ready to be a part of the new S.A. to take a walk, he basically changed the direction of a country. I've always wondered as to how arrogant a man must be to think that a speech from him will be enough to avoid a civil war... then I invariably wonder about just how great, charismatic, and talismanic he has to be to actually succeed.

For him to persevere in a life marred by unending personal tragedy, is a triumph of the soul which, much as he may have downplayed it, cannot possibly be overstated.

Here's a quote from Max Du Preez

"Many people outside South Africa make the same mistake as many white South Africans: they think Nelson Mandela is an exception; an aberration. Mandela is not like other black people, they say. They elevate Mandela to an unusual phenomenon because of a reluctance to admit that Africa could produce someone so exemplary.
This misconception lies at the heart of the paranoia among right wing South Africans, recently repeated in some foreign media, that when Mandela dies, black people will drop the pretence of the last twenty years and start murdering whites.
Mandela is a special, gifted man, but he has himself said many times, as has his old friend Walter Sisulu and others, that he is purely and simply a product of African and South African society, history and spirituality.
His character, leadership style, vision and sense of morality were shaped by his childhood in Qunu; his early years at the household of the Thembu regent Jongintaba Dalindyebo; at the Fort Hare and Witwatersrand universities; by his interaction with young ANC revolutionaries such as Sisulu, Anton Lembede and OR Tambo; his friendships with people like Yusuf Cachalia, Bram Fischer, Ahmed Kathrada and George Bizos; by his 27 years in jail – even by his contact over years with Afrikaans-speaking prison wardens.
A century from now historians will still write about Mandela’s spectacular role in bringing freedom, stability and democracy to South Africa. They will still remind their students that he became an international icon as a man of great integrity with an enormous capacity to forgive, to heal and to bridge seemingly impossible divides.
But they probably won’t record that he wasn’t the first remarkably wise and inspirational leader to emerge from this land. King Moshoeshoe (1787 – 1870) springs to mind. Unlike his more aggressive contemporaries like King Shaka and Chief Mzilikazi, he avoided war, gathered people from many clans and language groups to form a new inclusive nation and stabilized central South Africa at a time of great turmoil and bloodshed. Pure Mandela.
He was the protégé of Mohlomi (1720 – 1850), an extraordinary sage who taught a revolutionary philosophy of non-violence, participatory democracy and egalitarianism.
We can add many others to the list, like the Xhosa theologian and militarist Makhanda, Adam Kok of the Griqua, Sekhukhune of the Pedi, Kgama of the Tswana and Sobhuza of the Swazi.
But there were later leadership figures of great stature that belong in the same class as Mandela; people like Albert Luthuli, Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo and Desmond Tutu – some would also include Jan Smuts and Robert Sobukwe. Like Mandela, they were reflections of the best of South African history, culture and spirituality.
No nation will ever be blessed with two or more Mandela-type leaders in succession. The present leadership of the ruling party does not, to put it diplomatically, reflect the best of our society.
But there is a little bit of Mandela in most of us South Africans. He wasn’t a freak or a saint sent by some supernatural power. We are the products of the same history and society that produced a Nelson Mandela.
Above all, Nelson Mandela brought out the best in all his fellow citizens of all creeds, colours and classes.
He gave South Africans a glimpse of what they could be as a nation. He will remind them of that long after his passing.
To me, Mandela was living proof that good can prevail over evil, that there actually is something such as a shared humanity.
We’d better believe in that in years to come."

Beautifully written............I echo your sentiments entirely.......

However big worry for me is we could have Tiberius syndrome..........Where behaviour is checked while an Augustus figure is still alive out of respect for him and all he's done....

But comes out once he's departed..........Augustus was the glue that kept Rome together after the civil war with Anthony.........My guess is Mandela is the glue that kept S Africa from implosion......

Tiberius brought Rome to it's knees "The old goat goes for the does with his tongue"..

I pray S.Africa doesn't suffer the same fate now that there hero is gone..

and what a hero !!..broke the mould.

fishpaste - I take your point, and I actually agree with your assessment that there's a bit of Mandela in all (well most) South Africans. Where we differ, is that I genuinely believe Mandela is an aberration. He wasn't alone, of course. And the term "father of the nation", while a catchy moniker, is as you well know, a little bit of a misnomer. He is however the man who took charge, and in one tv segment all but stopped an oncoming civil war, paint it how you will, but that's a specially force of personality, one which isn't in abundance, and never has been.

Looking at the line of great Xhosa philosophers the country has been blessed with, I must admit it makes me very proud to have that blood running through my veins. As well as sharing a birthday with Mandela.

I don't think your worries of a Rome-esque scenario are warranted, Truss. Saffers are nothing if not extremely wheel to the shoulder. Judging by social media comments, and radio call ins, it has actually done the opposite of what you mention. The next ten days are going to be the most depressing in the country's history, but I'm positive that we can move from this.

As an aside, it's quite eerie that in the middle of December, hot summer for the last two weeks, there's a huge cloud (literally) hanging over Johannesburg. Not the most religious person, but I can't help but find it appropriate

‘…and the elements
So mixed in him that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world, “This was a man.”’

-William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, V, v, 78-80

R.I.P.