Thursday 27 June 2013
Representative says Nelson Mandela on life bear; Zuma cancels tour devices
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Representative
says Nelson Mandela on life bear; Zuma cancels tour devices
Pretoria, South Africa (CNN) -- South Africans lit candles outside the infirmary
where anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela lay Wednesday night amid a account
that the former leader was on life bear.
An official briefed on his condition said he was on life support,
but government spokesman Mac Maharaj declined to comment on the report, citing
doctor-patient confidentiality.
Mandela, 94, considered the founding father of South Africa's
multiracial dictatorship, has been hospitalized since June 8 for a recurring
lung infection.
Authorities have described his condition as critical since Sunday,
and after visiting him late Wednesday night, President Jacob Zuma canceled his
visit to Mozambique where he was supposed to attend a meeting Thursday on
infrastructure investment.
As the nation remained on edge, police barricaded the street
leading to the hospital's main entrance. Well-wishers hung balloon, stuffed
animals and messages of support along the wall, and crowds hovering nearby sang
"Where is Mandela?"Revolutionary and
politician Nelson Mandela
p"We need you!," one sign read.
"We love you tata, get well soon!" said another, referring to Mandela
by the Xhosa word for father.
Several relations came out to collect some of those items
Wednesday.
"He's going to feel a lot better when he sees these
signs," said David Manaway, Mandela's grandson-in-law.
His former physician and the nation's ex-surgeon general, Dr.
Vejay Ramlakan, also visited the hospital Wednesday, said the national news
agency, South African Press Association.
Mandela became an international figure while enduring 27 years in
prison for fighting against apartheid, the country's system of racial
segregation. He was elected the nation's first black president in 1994, four
years after he was freed.
"He is our hero. He is my mentor, my father. He is the whole
thing to me," said Kuda Nyahumzvi, 36. "But when it is his time, we
wish his soul could just rest. He spent so long in jail and struggling."
Even as he has faded from the spotlight, he remains popular and is
considered a hero of democracy worldwide.
As South Africans steel themselves for the worst, details emerged
about the family's meeting in his boyhood home of Qunu on Tuesday. An
archbishop also stopped by the hospital and conducted prayers, calling for
"a quiet night and a peaceful, perfect end" for the former president.
Archbishop Thabo Makgoba joined the family at the hospital where
Mandela remain in critical condition, the South African Press Association
reported.
"Fill them with your holy nerve and the gift of credulous
faith, and take away their qualms so that they may dare to face their anguish,"
he said, according to a copy of the prayer
posted on the bishop's website.
"And maintain all of us with your steadfast love so that we
may be filled with thankfulness for all the good that he has done for us and
for our nation, and may honor his legacy through our lives."
for the duration of the convention in Qunu, funeral planning were
not part of the talks, family friend Bantu Holomisa said, according to SAPA.
As a former head of state, plans for Mandela's funeral are spearhead
by the direction, according to Holomisa.
Mandela turns 95 in July.
CNN's Faith Karimi wrote and contributed from Atlanta. CNN's
Brent Swails, Matt Smith, Catherine E. Shoichet, John Raedler and Michael
Martinez contributed to this report.
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