Share your breakfast with Zelda

POLOKWANE – Nelson Mandela’s former personal assistant and devoted friend, Zelda la Grange, will visit the city on Saturday, August 16 to speak at the Pathways Appreciation Breakfast at Protea Hotel Ranch Resort.

Pathways Polokwane is a non-profit stimulation centre for children with disabilities. The organisation provides educational programmes and bursaries at their Enrichment Centre.

The Pathways Appreciation Breakfast is a wonderful inspirational event for friends and family, but also an excellent corporate opportunity for personnel enrichment and for treating special clients.

Zelda says she grew up in Pretoria. After completing her studies, she joined the department of state expenditure and worked in the human resources division. She joined the president’s office as senior ministerial typist in 1994 and became Mandela’s head of logistics.

Working closely with various government departments, she coordinated Mandela’s itinerary, travel arrangements, security and transport and accompanied him on domestic and international visits when needed.

Zelda says she was officially appointed one of Mandela’s three private secretaries in 1997 and, upon his retirement in May 1999, remained in his service.

Zelda served Mandela as personal assistant on a part time arrangement since his retirement from public life in 2008.

She has embarked on several other initiatives, of which notably Bikers for Mandela Day, an initiative through which she pays tribute to her employer of more than 18 years by doing community work and encouraging others to do the same.

She is also involved in several other civil society initiatives and was awarded by a number of institutions for her commitment, loyalty and dedication to Mandela over the past 18 years. She spends much of her time encouraging young people to find their passion in life and then to pursue it.

In her talk at the Pathways event, Zelda will share her experiences and world view with guests. She will explain how her experiences impacted her life and encourage others to serve their communities with commitment in order to realise their full potential.

Zelda will also speak about her book, Good Morning, Mr Mandela, that was released in June. Review spoke to residents, Sonja Randall and Adéle van der Linde, who read the book, to find out what they thought about Zelda’s memoires of her life with Mandela.

Sonja says she loves the book.

“It is wonderful to see how far she came. She started out as no one and made something of her life, because somebody believed in her.”

Adéle says she finds the book very interesting.

“It is a well written book with many lessons. Zelda is an inspiration.”

The Pathways Appreciation Breakfast is an event to celebrate the women of Limpopo during Women’s Month, August. “We will acknowledge and celebrate the phenomenal creation that woman are as well as the contribution they make to our society, community and families,” says Sally Hansen of S Hansen and Associates, organiser of the breakfast.

“We at Pathways are in awe of the strength of the mothers of disabled children who have to face so many challenges and burdens. For this reason we are launching this project.”

Sally says they aim to treat their guests to a dynamic event taking them away from the burdens and troubles of life. The event aims to enable women to leave motivated, enriched and stronger people to go back into their everyday lives with passion.

She thanks Tom and Vicky Shearer for their hospitality as they will play hosts to the event at Protea Hotels The Ranch. “Our sincere thanks are further extended to all contributing towards the costs of the event.”

All funds raised from the event go to Pathways Polokwane.

Tickets cost R300 per person or R3 000 for a table of 10. This includes an excellent breakfast and Zelda la Grange’s motivational presentation.

Tickets are available at

• Mitchell House;

• S Hansen and Associates at 33 Plein Street;

• DHL Express on the corner of Marshall and Dorp Street, and

• Greener Tidings at The Farmyard.

Requests for corporate invoices can be sent by fax to (015) 291 5180 or by email to sally@shansen.co.za or sarah@shansen.co.za.

For any further information contact Sally or Sarah at (015) 295 5292/5843