Squabbling clan ought to put Mandela’s needs first

IN a week in which South Africa and much of the world held their breath over former president Nelson Mandela’s health, the anti-apartheid struggle icon’s family was hit by a new series of infighting and controversy. A group of family members, including Mandela’s wife, Graça Machel, took one of his grandsons — ANC MP Mandla Mandela — to court in a bid to force him to return the remains and graves of three relatives to Qunu, Mandela’s home village.

In a separate case, the father of one of Mandela’s granddaughters took a US television station to court in an effort to stop his daughter featuring on a TV reality show, Being Mandela.

The cases are the latest in a long list of incidents over the past decade that have exposed disunity and feuding in the extended family of the world-renowned leader.

These undignified battles, coming as they do during a difficult time for Mandela, who is reported to be in a critical, albeit stable, state in hospital, undoubtedly tarnish the great statesman’s legacy.

Mandela, who successfully led South Africa out of apartheid and into democracy and national reconciliation after 27 years as a political prisoner on Robben Island and elsewhere, deserves much better than to have his name dragged through the mud in what cannot be interpreted as anything but unseemly haste by individual family members to acquire power.

Instead of family members such as Mandela’s eldest daughter, Makaziwe, accusing journalists of being “vultures” for reporting on the former president’s health, they should use this period as an opportunity to bring about peace and harmony among Madiba’s descendants.

Mandela has largely led a life of hardship, primarily because of his dedication to the struggle for democratic and nonracial change in South Africa. It is a struggle that necessarily demanded the sacrifice of many things that we would deem normal — among them a family life spent with his children and grandchildren. This must have left many of those closest to him with deep emotional scars.

But this family owes it to Mandela — a man who won over the hearts of even his sworn enemies through his pursuit of national reconciliation and peace — to put an end to the squabbles.

As South Africa and the world prepare for the inevitable, the former president deserves to be at peace and with a family that is completely focused on providing him with all the care and comfort he needs during his continued stay in hospital.

The Mandelas must put his interests above their individual demands for material wealth and recognition.