AT PEACE IN DEATH
Mandela was ‘giving up’ in final struggle End painful for loved ones of great leader
HE WENT in peace.
Nelson Mandela’s last hours were quiet and tranquil, though his passing was painful for loved ones who clustered around his death bed, they said Sunday.
The revered South African leader wasn’t on life support and appeared to be sleeping calmly not long before he died Thursday, according to Bantu Holomisa, a friend who said he was called to Mandela’s home to bid the celebrated freedom fighter farewell.
The friend said it was obvious that Mandela was “giving up” in his last struggle. He said about 20 relatives had gathered at his home.
“I’ve seen people who are on their last hours, and I could sense that he is now giving up,” said Holomisa, who grew close to Mandela after the anti-apartheid hero’s 1990release from prison.
“You could see it is not Madiba anymore,” he told The Associated Press, using Mandela’s clan name. “This time around when I was there he was not on life support. I could see that his condition had deteriorated.”
The 95-year-old former president died about two hours after Holomisa, a deputy minister in Mandela’s cabinet, left his bedside.
Holomisa said the mood in the home was somber as Mandela’s legendary life drew to a close.
“I felt him slipping away in front of me early in the morning,” the leader’s oldest surviving child, Makaziwe (Maki) Mandela, told Britain’s Sunday Mirror newspaper.
“I felt I was losing my loved one. I was so sad and watched my father die in front of my eyes.”
Maki said her father wowed doctors with his determination to battle to the end.
“Theysaid they had never had a patient like him in their lives, she said.“He was a medical wonder.”
Maki, 59, said the doctors alerted her family that Mandela was nearing death’s door.
“We knew he would die . . . the doctors knew,” she said.
“They took us through it, and he slowly deteriorated. I was there as he slipped away.”
The first details of Mandela’s final hours surfaced Sunday as South Africans of all races and religions came together fora poignant national day of mourning.
With soaring hymns and solemn prayers —in grand cathedrals, storefront mosques and tin-roofed township churches — millions of people paid tribute to the man who freed South Africa from apartheid and united people of all races, tribes and faiths in the fractious rainbow nation.
Thousands gathered at the Regina Mundi Catholic Church in the heart of Johannesburg’s Soweto section, where Mandela once lived. The house of worship is revered as a shrine in the struggle against apartheid.
The Rev. Sebastian Rassool sprinkled water on rapt congregants and choir members, pleading with them to carry on Mandela’s legacy.
“I believe there is another Madiba — another man or woman who can lead us now,” Rassool preached. “It’s up to you and it’s up to me.”
The strains of “Kumbaya” echoed from the 40-foot-high roof of the Soweto church, which was a gathering spot for activists during the grim days of apartheid.
“Today I am asking God to carry us on now that Tata is gone,” said Patrick Mahlangu, 59, a retired laborer, using a nickname for the civil rights champion. “This place is where we used to eat tear gas and now we are free. We have Madiba to thank for that, and that’s why we are here.”
International leaders, including President Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron, will travel to Johannesburg for a memorial service Tuesday.
But Sunday was a day for local people to honor their hero. Joy Chauke arrived at the Regina Mundi service dressed in the regalia of the Orlando Pirates soccer team, Mandela’s favorite.
“Each and every person in this country has heard Madiba’s message,” said Chauke, whose face was painted in a traditional style.
Outside the red brick church, Oupa Msibi pedaled a Nestle ice cream stand down a rutted street.
The vendor said he was happy to have a job and credited Mandela with giving him hope.
“He gave us everything — he saved all of us,” Msibi said, hawking $1.70 chocolate cones. “Absolutely there is a future now.”
Glen Nyathi, 47, warned that the nation’s current leaders will face the wrath of the people if they fail to live up to Mandela’s legacy. “We will call them out,” Nyathi said. “They need to remember the lessons of Madiba.”
Patience Tshabalala recounted how Mandela and his former wife, Winnie, would worship at Holy Cross Anglican Church, a stone’s throw from their So we to home.
The couple would sit in the middle of the church and greet whoever happened to be sitting next to them, Tshabalala said.
“Anybody could shake his hand,” said Tshabalala, 38.
Mandela’s spirit was also felt in tiny, ramshackle churches and open-air revival meetings.
“Nelson Mandela, no one looks like you,” dozens of worshippers packed into the one-room Zion Mission Church sang in the Zulu language. “Nelson Mandela, we love you.”
In the crime-riddled township of Eldorado Park, at the Al-Rahman mosque, Nazier Phyllis, 39, said Mandela’s lasting message was that of unity.
“For him, it wasn’t about any one group,” said Phyllis. “It was about all of us South Africans, black, white or colored, Christian or Muslim.”
In the leafy suburb of Riviera, Jewish South Africans packed a synagogue to thank Mandela.
The crowd at the Oxford Shul intoned the mournful yizkor, the prayer for the dead.
Ada Le Boff said she was amazed at the turnout, which she said was bigger than for the Jewish High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur combined. “He cared about all of us,” she said.
Even one of Mandela’s former jailers was remembering the leader.
Christo Brand, a guard at the Robben Island prison where Mandela was held for 18 years, told The Associated Press that the national hero for gave him.
“When I got the message when he passed away, it was very sad for me,” Brand said. “But I think he was successful and he did what he wanted to do. I wanted him to go in peace.”