TODAY, Friday, December 6 is the day the country mourns. The ‘father of the nation’, 95-year-old Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, died at his Houghton, Johannesburg home last night following a long illness. The outpouring of grief and touching messages flooding social media platforms bears testament to love and admiration Madiba inspired not only in South Africa, but throughout the world.
Although he will probably be best remembered as South Africa’s first black president (from 1994 to 1999) it is in his role as humanitarian and philanthropist that made a difference in so many ordinary peoples’ lives. Children have always been particularly close to his heart.
A shining example of this is a cold winter’s night in 1995, when he stopped to talk to street children in Cape Town. “The children asked me why I love them. This astounded me, and I asked them why they asked this, and they said that because every time I get money from overseas, I share it with them,” he explained. This inspired him to found the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, to which he pledged to donate one third of his salary. Although the Fund continues to assist young homeless people and those living in poverty, it now focuses on the underprivileged, orphans of the AIDS crisis, those affected by HIV and AIDS, and ‘child-headed households’ in South Africa.
