South Africa Keeps Vigil, Prays for Mandela

 

Former president of South Africa, Nelson Mandela, remained in a critical condition in hospital yesterday, leaving millions of his countrymen and admirers across the world keeping vigil and praying, even as they feared the worst.“Former President Mandela remains in a critical condition in hospital.

The doctors are doing everything possible to ensure his wellbeing and comfort,” President Jacob Zuma was quoted by the Agence France Presse (AFP) as saying  Monday.

Mandela, the hero of black South Africans’ battle for freedom who spent 27 years in jail during the apartheid regime, was rushed to hospital on June 8 with a recurrent lung infection.

Despite intensive treatment at Pretoria's Mediclinic Heart Hospital, the 94-year-old’s condition appeared to have suddenly deteriorated over the last 48 hours.

“All of us in the country should accept that Madiba is now old,” Zuma said, using Mandela’s clan name.
“I think what we need to do as a country is to pray for him to be well and that the doctors do their work.”

Zuma hailed the life of a man seen as the father of the nation and globally as a moral beacon that continues to shine long after he retired from public life.

“He is the father of democracy and this is the man who fought and sacrificed his life,” said Zuma, who spent 10 years in jail on Robben Island at the same time as Mandela.

Zuma visited Mandela on Sunday evening.
“Given the hour that we got to the hospital it was late, he was already asleep,” Zuma said. “(We) saw him and then we had a bit of discussion with the doctors and his wife, Graca Machel.”
Mandela, who became South Africa's first black president in 1994 to end almost 50 years of apartheid rule, is due to celebrate his 95th birthday on July 18.

He has been hospitalised four times since December, mostly for the pulmonary condition that has plagued him for years.