Nelson Mandela, South Africa's Moral Center is Dead at 95

Nelson Mandela affectionately known as Madiba is dead at 95. A great man has died.

(SAN FRANCISCO) - Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999. He was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election.

Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist, and the leader of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC). In 1962 he was arrested and convicted of sabotage and other charges, and sentenced to life in prison. Mandela served 27 years in prison, spending eighteen of these years on Robben Island. At Robben Island, Mandela worked in the lime, which caused the damage to his lungs that led to his death.

Following his release from prison on February 11, 1990, Mandela led his party in the negotiations that led to multi-racial democracy in 1994.

Since his retirement in 1999, one of Mandela's primary commitments has been the fight against AIDS. His son, Makgatho Mandela, died of AIDS on January 6, 2005. AIDS continues to be a major problem in South Africa and indeed, in all of Africa. An estimated 5.6 million people were living with HIV and AIDS in South Africa in 2011, more than in any other country. In that same year, an estimated 270.000 South Africans died of AIDS.

In 2002, my wife Judi and I visited South Africa. While we were in Cape Town, we took a ferry ride to Robben Island, the political prison where Nelson Mandela and other ANC leaders were imprisoned. The island is now a museum and the guides are former prisoners. Our guide served 8 years of a 10 year sentence for carrying explosives. He described the appalling conditions that the inmates endured. Our guide recounted how he had recently met a former prison guard, who had beaten him daily. The former guard was on the island to show his wife and two young children where he used to work. The guide warned him that if he was on his tour, he would single him out as one of the brutal prison guards. The former guard decided not to take his family on the tour. The guard did say he would like to sit down and talk with our guide. The guide said he had mixed emotions about such a meeting. I have always wondered whether the two ever met and, if so, the outcome of the meeting.

During our visit to Soweto, a Black township just outside Johannesburg, we asked one of our black guides about his feelings toward white South Africans. He told us that Nelson Mandela invited his prison warden to sit at the head table at his inauguration and then commented, "Where our leader leads, we must follow no matter how bitter or angry we feel."

We also visited Guguletu, a township near Cape Town. Our Black guide took us to a Community development project where we dined on African cuisine, including one of Mandela's favorite dishes -- a tasty casserole of beans and corn. Our Black guide took us to his squatter shack in the township. It was a two-room shack where he and his young son lived. The inhabitants of four such shacks shared an outhouse, which was cleaned once a week. We saw first hand how thousands of Blacks lived during apartheid.

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Anonymous December 7, 2013 5:46 pm (Pacific time)

One of the most horrible but effective terrorist tools the radical blacks have used to eliminate and intimidate those who might stand up against them is “neck lacing.” This consists of binding the hands and feet of the victim, draping a gasoline-filled tire around his or her neck and setting it afire, subjecting the victim to a slow, excruciatingly painful death. This is done by mobs, who add to the suffering by beating and stoning the writhing victims. (Winnie Mandela’s Secret describes and shows actual scenes of this barbarism.) It is unthinkable that anyone who has condoned, much less encouraged, such atrocities would be welcomed in this country, honored by high officials, cheered at mass gatherings, and escape any critical comment by our ever-vigilant media. It is equally unthinkable that a person who had been implicated in the abduction, torture and murder of a 14-year-old black renowned as an anti-apartheid activist would be honored by the American people, its media and especially by American blacks. But this is exactly what happened when Winnie Mandela came here with her husband. In April 1986, Winnie Mandela publicly endorsed “neck lacing,” telling a Soweto mob, “With our necklaces we will liberate this country.” Mrs. Mandela was also implicated in January 1989 in the abduction of three young black men and a boy from a Methodist Church shelter. Mrs. Mandela’s bodyguards, known as the “Mandela United Football Club,” snatched them and took them to Mrs. Mandela’s home where they were beaten, whipped and subjected to other forms of torture. The object was to get them to say that the Methodist minister, who is white, had abused them sexually. Two of them did so but later recanted. A third escaped. The boy, 14-year-old Mokhetsi “Stempie” Seipei, did not give in and was beaten into unconsciousness. On January 7, 1989, his battered body was found in a field with his throat slit. Stempie was famous as an anti-apartheid activist, having been arrested for his activities when he was only 10. The police went to Mrs. Mandela’s home in Soweto, where they confiscated weapons, noted blood-splattered walls in outbuildings, and seized large quantities of bedding, carpeting and a van for forensic examination. Mrs. Mandela claimed that she was not home when the torture took place, but even Tom Sebina, the ANC spokesman in Lusaka, Zambia, doubted that claim. The survivors said Mrs. Mandela was present and had participated in the torture, and they testified to that effect when the leader of the bodyguards was tried for murder in May 1990. The judge said in his summation that the evidence showed that Mrs. Mandela had been present and had taken part in the beatings. He said the evidence had “the ring of truth,” implicitly suggesting that Winnie Mandela was an accomplice in the crimes, even though she had not been charged. This was reported in a lengthy story, largely devoted to the murder case. by the New York paper, Newsday, on June 20, the day the Mandelas arrived in New York City.

Steve Moylet December 7, 2013 10:47 am (Pacific time)

Luke I have been to South Africa two times, though it's been over 35 years since my last trip. I did not go as a tourist, and I saw the real deal. It was incredibly violent then, and from my contacts, both from former black and white associates, it continues to worsen. Go there yourself and go to any skyscraper and hit the stairwells...Mandela was a confessed terrorist who refused to renounce the use of terror. Mandela was a genocidal communist.
They are committing genocide against white people in South Africa( stage 6 genocide) . Google and check images (below links)...

the latest trend is rape , and disembowelment of white women in South Africa, with the Sanction of the black government(legacy of Mandela). google this if

you think I’m lying.

The U.S. news media, it seems, celebrates the below pictures. Please look at these pictures, then tell me in conjunction with "Knock-out" and other crimes here in

America, why you think we are going to continue to ignore this?

https://www.google.com/search?q=genocide+south+africa&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=lUCiUseaNsflkAf21IDQBA&sqi=2&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=671&bih=295

they are raping then disemboweling (while alive) white women some as old as 80 and young little girls too

https://www.google.com/search?q=tire+necklace+torture&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=CEWiUr7eNovfkQeI34DIDg&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=671&bih=295#q=south+africa

+rape+of+white+women&tbm=isch

Mandela:
“The cause of Communism is the greatest cause in the history of mankind!”

“There’s one place where (Fidel Castro’s) Cuba stands out head and shoulders above the rest – that is in its love for human rights and liberty!” GOOD GRIEF!

Luke Easter December 6, 2013 7:47 pm (Pacific time)

Anonymous? R U in the Witness Protection Program? What have you done to enhance the world? Easy to make such statements w/o leaving your name for a Rebuttal.

Anonymous December 6, 2013 5:54 pm (Pacific time)

Mandela, a communist revolutionary, killed less of his own people than did other communist revolutionaries. I guess that's an accomplishment. I have heard over and over how great he was; but what did he DO? All this rambling about him as an "icon" is frothy and full of adulation, but I have YET to hear how he CONCRETELY made anyone's life better. I guess he helped institute a better voting process and government in South Africa....but REALLY could he have done it without de Klerk's support? And what was his RECORD as a chief executive? The media keeps talking about how he was SA's first black President. Big whoop. Clint Eastwood made a movie about how he helped some soccer team... But his actual RECORD....did he create jobs? Did he save lives? Did he lower taxes, create wealth? Lots of SIZZLE out there about him, but is there any STEAK? Maybe the real sizzle..like a burning tire necktie sizzles? Yes. Liberals loved him because he was a communist who hated white people and consorted with terrorists. Sound like others here in America where one finds so many who live off the blood and sacrifice of our veterans. JUST LOOK AT THE VIOLENCE RATES NOW IN SA, AND WHAT THEY WERE BEFORE MANDELA/ANC CAME TO POWER. I EXPECT A MASSIVE UPTICK IN THE VIOLENCE AGAINST WHITES, WHICH IS ALREADY THE WORST IN THE WORLD NOW THAT ZIMBABWE HAS KILLED ALL THE WHITES THERE. MANDELA WAS A TOOL OF THE SOVIET UNION AND CASTRO.

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