South Africa holds state funeral for Mandela

[Lite Beer]

South Africa holds state funeral for Mandela
CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA

Guests and family members arrive for the funeral service for former South African president Nelson Mandela in Qunu, South Africa, Sunday, December 15, 2013.

QUNU, South Africa:-- Big guns fired a salute in the rural village where Nelson Mandela grew up and military servicemen marched stiffly behind his casket on a winding dirt road Sunday as South Africa said goodbye for the last time to the man who reconciled the country in its most vulnerable period.

Several thousand guests, some singing and dancing, gathered in a huge tent at the family compound of the anti-apartheid leader, who died Dec. 5 at the age of 95 after a long illness.

Guests included senior South African officials, veterans of the fight against white rule and foreign diplomats, including US Ambassador Patrick Gaspard. Britain’s Prince Charles, entrepreneur Richard Branson and former Zimbabwean prime minister Morgan Tsvangirai were also there.

Mandela’s portrait was placed behind two rows of candles in the white, dome-shaped marquee. Outside, South African honor guards from the army, navy and air force marched in formation. Mandela’s casket, covered by a national flag, was transported on a military vehicle to the tent, where pallbearers carried it on a red carpet into the tent where guests awaited.

After the funeral ceremony, a smaller group of guests was to attend Mandela’s burial at a family grave site on the estate in Qunu, a rural village in Eastern Cape province.

The burial will end 10 days of mourning ceremonies that included a massive stadium memorial in Johannesburg and three days during which Mandela’s body lay in state in the capital, Pretoria.

Mandela’s casket arrived at the family compound from the capital on Saturday. It was accompanied by an enormous convoy of police, military and other vehicles.

Mandela spent 27 years in jail as a prisoner from apartheid, then emerged to lead a delicate transition to democracy when many South Africans feared that the country would sink into all-out racial conflict. He became president in the first all-race elections in 1994.

While South Africa faces many problems, including crime, unemployment and economic inequality, Mandela is seen by many compatriots as the father of their nation and around the world as an example of the healing power of reconciliation

-- The Nation 2013-12-15

[4evermaat]

RIP. The kind of courage it took to cultivate peace during and after aparthid is nothing less than amazing.

"Second best time to plant a tree is today" sent from note2 TV app

[Lite Beer]

Phuket: Mandela laid to rest

QUNU, SOUTH AFRICA: A 21-gun salute and full honour guard escorted the coffin of Nelson Mandela as his state funeral got underway Sunday in the rolling hills of his rural boyhood home.

A Xhosa hymn, Fulfill Your Promise, sounded the start of the ceremony, organised to reflect the traditions of his tribe and the pride of the country he transformed as dissident and president.

The specially constructed marquee venue held 4,500 people, with pride of place going to Mandela's family, including his widow Graca Machel and ex-wife Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.

Top government officials and foreign dignitaries and celebrities, ranging from Britain's Prince Charles to US talk show queen Oprah Winfrey, were also in attendance.

Mandela's flag-draped casket was brought to the ceremony on a gun carriage as the 21-gun salute rang out over the surrounding hills of Eastern Cape province.

The funeral closes the final chapter on a towering public figure whose courage and moral fortitude turned him into a global symbol of freedom and hope.

And it ends 10 days of national mourning during which hundreds of thousands of South Africans turned out in torrential rain and searing sunshine to grieve, remember and celebrate the life of their first elected black leader.

The formal section of the state funeral was to last two hours and was broadcast around the world.

The public was shut out of the interment itself, which the family has insisted will be a private affair with close friends.

The graveyard sits on the sprawling family estate Mandela built in Qunu after his release from prison in 1990.

"It was in that village that I spent some of the happiest years of my boyhood and whence I trace my earliest memories," he wrote in his autobiography.

Overseen by male members of his clan, the burial will include the slaughter of an ox -- a ritual performed through various milestones of a person's life under the clan's traditions.

During the ceremony, Mandela will be referred to as Dalibhunga -- the name given to him at the age of 16 after undergoing the initiation to adulthood

Mourners will wear traditional Xhosa regalia, with blue and white beaded headgear and necklaces.

Xhosa speakers are divided into several groups, including the Thembu people, of which Mandela is a member.

Although Mandela never publicly declared his religious denomination, his family comes from a Methodist background.

Funeral plans were briefly overshadowed by an outcry after Mandela's old friend and fellow Nobel peace laureate Desmond Tutu said he had not been invited.

In the end Tutu did attend, and the government tried to brush off the confusion as a misunderstanding.

Tutu -- who baptised South Africa the "Rainbow Nation" -- has been a persistent critic of the government of President Jacob Zuma and has also spoken out against infighting in Mandela's family.

Over the years, the archbishop emeritus has presided over the funerals of some of the anti-apartheid movement's leading lights, including Steve Biko, Chris Hani and Walter Sisulu.

While Mandela had been critically ill for months, the announcement of his death on December 5 was still sent a spasm through a country struggling to carry forward his vision of a harmonious multi-racial democracy of shared prosperity.

For the rest of the world, it marked the loss of that rarest of world leaders who are viewed with near universal respect and admiration.

Gushing tributes poured in from every corner of the globe, although Mandela himself had always stressed he was part of a communal leadership and resisted any move towards his public canonisation -- posthumous or otherwise.

"He is finally coming home to rest, I can't even begin to describe the feeling I have inside," said 31-year-old Bongani Zibi, a mourner in Qunu, as the funeral cortege carrying Mandela's casket arrived on Saturday.

"Part of me is sad but I'm also happy that he has found peace."

Source: http://www.thephuketnews.com/mandela-laid-to-rest-43447.php

-- Phuket News 2013-12-15

[tominbkk]

Wonder who they got to do the sign language this time?

[Chicog]

So with a bit of luck from Tuesday onwards we might actually get some news on the news channels?

Having said that I checked out Fox and apparently the No. 1 news story in the whole world is that they've found something else to whinge about on Obamacare.

[Chicog]

Saturday Night Live have a skit of Obama speaking and a sign language interpreter behind him.

[Munger]

So with a bit of luck from Tuesday onwards we might actually get some news on the news channels?

Having said that I checked out Fox and apparently the No. 1 news story in the whole world is that they've found something else to whinge about on Obamacare.

But 57 % of Americans whinge / dont want Obamacare. Why blame Fox.

[Scott]

This topic is about Nelson Mandela.