Against all odds, it has to be said, the family of Nelson Mandela are able to celebrate his 95th birthday with him today (Thursday) as, according to a family spokesperson, he “continues to improve” in hospital in Pretoria.
Weeks since South Africa’s first truly democratically elected president’s condition was considered so grave that many lobbied for any treatment that was keeping him alive to be withdrawn “to end his suffering”, his youngest daughter told reporters that her father is able to communicate and watch television.
Zindziswa ‘Zindzi’ Mandela told Sky News: “I saw him yesterday afternoon with my mother and he was watching TV with his little headphones and gave us a huge smile.” She added that the former president was responding to visitors with his eyes and sometimes his hands.
“You can see he is there in his eyes, the same energy and strength,” Ms Mandela said, adding she hoped he would be out of hospital “soon”.
If true, the news is remarkable in view of the fact that other members of the family claimed Mandela was in a “persistent vegetative state”, a claim refuted at the time by government representatives.
Schoolchildren throughout South Africa started the day by singing “Happy Birthday Madiba”. Jacob Zuma’s government will host a ceremony for the symbolic handing over of Mr Mandela’s new high-tech ID card, which will be received by Zindzi. The event is laden with poignancy in a country where pass books were a fundamental element. Black citizens were forced to carry pass books and limited to certain areas at certain times.
Zindzi, who was just 18 months when her father was sent to Robben Island, said the family was planning a special present for the former president on his 95th birthday.
She said on Wednesday: “Naturally it’s very difficult to come up with an ideal gift… So normally we just do huge, huge picture frames of all the family events and members of the family. We’ve got another huge collage to give him tomorrow.”
However, Ms Mandela said that a “true present” for him would be for the people around the world to each give 67 minutes of service to their communities, to match the 67 years the former leader gave to fighting for civil rights.
South African biker gangs will duly clean streets, volunteers will paint schools and politicians will spend 67 minutes on worthy projects.
Elsewhere world leaders, pop stars and companies also plan to pledge their support for Mr Mandela.
“I will also be giving my 67 minutes to make the world a better place, one small step at a time,” said Sir Richard Branson.
Also in the UK, a giant portrait of Mr Mandela’s face has been etched into the English countryside to celebrate his birthday. Created in the form of a maze set into corn crops, The Quex Park Mandela Maize Maze in Birchington, near Margate, Kent, was the brainchild of Karen Botha and Dawn Tilley who have spent the past five years working on the design.
The maze, which always has an African theme to tie in with the Powell Cotton Museum, is owned by Ms Tilley and the designs are made by her brother Darren.
Ms Tilley, who runs a livery yard, said: “I opened the maze with Karen Botha who is now a director at the museum. She is from Zimbabwe and the Nelson Mandela design was her idea. We like to tie the maze in with the museum’s African theme and have used animal and native designs before. We thought Nelson Mandela was very current.”
