'Rainbow Nation' Mourners Swarm Mandela's Mansion

Mourners from Nigeria, sing outside the home of former president Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg, South Africa, Monday, Dec. 9, 2013. Along a street lined with walled mansions shaded by graceful jacaranda trees, mourners black and white by the thousands rubbed shoulders Monday outside the villa where Nelson Mandela died, placing flower bouquets and condolence notes on top of piles already knee-high. Others danced while singing praise for the anti-apartheid leader _ a vivid example of the “Rainbow Nation” unity of race-blind multiculturalism championed by Mandela for South Africa.

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — Along a street lined with walled mansions shaded by graceful jacaranda trees, mourners, black and white, by the thousands rubbed shoulders Monday outside the villa where Nelson Mandela died, placing flower bouquets and condolence notes on top of piles already knee-high. Others danced while singing praise for the anti-apartheid leader — a vivid example of the "Rainbow Nation" unity of race-blind multiculturalism championed by Mandela for South Africa.

As players for the nation's top Kaiser Chiefs soccer team were escorted inside the villa in one of the city's most exclusive neighborhoods to grieve with Mandela's relatives, hospital receptionist Nelson Jabulani Dube said the crowd of black, white and mixed race mourners transforming a street corner into a makeshift shrine was evidence that Mandela succeeded in breaking down barriers in a country defined for generations by race-based hate.

"It's all because of him, because he forgave the enemies at that time, they no longer are the enemies," said Dube, 33. "For me the outcome is really stunning and unites us, and what you see here is a reflection of that."
Michele Marija, an elderly white Johannesburg resident, spontaneously hugged a black woman, calling her "my sister," after the woman made space for her so she could get a better view of the shrine. Then Marija's daughters also hugged the woman.

Marija insisted that her daughters and granddaughters visit Mandela's house, saying his decision to forgive his white oppressors after being released from 27 years in jail saved South Africa from brutal bloodshed.
"We could easily have had a revolution and here we are now all living happily together which is something like a miracle and it's all due to Madiba," Marija said, referring to Mandela by his clan name.

Diane Mathabatha, a 60-year-old member of Mandela's Xhosa tribe visiting Mandela's house with her grandsons, remembered in the 1990s being bent on revenge along with much of her generation until Mandela got out of prison and said that would be wrong.

"He came out and embraced everybody and taught us that, you know, sometimes with your enemy, when you bring him closer, it's much better than fighting him," Mathabatha said. Mncedisi Xego, related to Mathabatha by marriage, came to the shrine with his wife Lesley, who is white, and their children. Their 9-year marriage wouldn't exist without Mandela, he said, adding that their children needed to see the shrine.
"It was very important for them to come and say 'thank you' to Mandela because today, they can have the kind of lifestyle that they chose," Xego said. "There are no restrictions in terms of where they can go, which schools they can go to, whom they can be friends with, who they can marry."

As mourners danced in a circle singing "Mandiba, you are the holy man" in the Sesotho language, retired white school principal Johann Nel struck up a conversation with 29-year-old medical salesman Ricardo Louw, recounting how he managed to keep his marriage to his black wife Maria secret during apartheid.
Nel and his wife Maria married in Swaziland because apartheid prohibited mixed marriages. She went to live in Mozambique, and he drove there weekends to visit. They went on to have two children, but in 1975 worried that he wouldn't be able to visit anymore as Mozambique neared independence from Portugal.

So they decided to smuggle her and the children back into South Africa so they could live separately, but secretly visit each other. To make it by South African border police, Maria Nel got out of the car and walked through on her own since she would have been prevented from entering with her husband. He laid down their baby boy on the floor of the passenger seat covered with newspapers and had their 3-year-old son lie on back seat covered with a jacket and clothes.

Johann Nel cracked his window to slip paperwork to the border control police stating he was the only person in the car, praying the officer wouldn't demand to look under the newspapers or the clothing.
"But it was as if God had blinded that policeman's eyes," he said. The officer waved him through and he reunited down the road with his wife. They lived separately in secret until they could finally be together as a family until more than a decade later.

Louw, who is black and has a white girlfriend, listened in awe and then said that Mandela's work and legacy "spared us those kind of frustrations." "She says if it wasn't for this man we wouldn't be together," Louw said.

But some South Africans who came to pay their respect outside Mandela's home said the gathering was meaningful but a rare kind of event in the country. Yvette Babb, a 30-year-old white economist who decided with her work companions to do a jog by the house during their lunch break, said the last time she has seen something similar was when the country banded together as one during the 2010 World Cup. "It's something we don't experience often enough."

Obama Heads To South Africa For Mandela Memorial

President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama board Air Force One to travel to South Africa for a memorial service in honor of Nelson Mandela on Monday, Dec. 9, 2013 in Andrews Air Force Base, Md.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama headed to South Africa on Monday to speak at a national memorial service for anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela. He was joined on Air Force One by former President George W. Bush and former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Obama and his wife, Michelle, boarded the plane under cold, rainy skies for the long flight. Bush and his wife, Laura, and Clinton, already were on board. Former President Bill Clinton was traveling separately from Rio de Janeiro, where he was attending a Clinton Global Initiative event. And former President Jimmy Carter also planned to join the group in Johannesburg.

George H.W. Bush is the only living president who will not attend. His spokesman said the 89-year-old no longer is able to travel long distances. The American leaders will join dozens of other dignitaries and tens of thousands of mourners at the memorial service at a Johannesburg stadium. Mandela will be buried Dec. 15, after a state funeral in his hometown of Qunu.

Obama is to be one of the speakers at Tuesday's memorial. White House officials said Obama was hoping to meet with Mandela's widow, Graca Machel, and pay respects to the extended Mandela family. Also traveling with Obama on Air Force One were Attorney General Eric Holder and Susan Rice, Obama's national security adviser.

About two hours after Obama's departure, Vice President Joe Biden, who stayed behind, visited the South African embassy in Washington with his wife, Jill, to sign a condolence book in Mandela's memory. "Through his unflagging, unflinching commitment to human dignity and his willingness to forgive, he inspired us and challenged us all to do better," Biden wrote.

Obama has called Mandela a personal hero, and his own political rise has drawn inevitable comparisons to the former South African leader. Each was his nation's first black president and a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize — though those close to the U.S. leader say he is aware of the vast differences in the politicians' experiences.

"President Obama would believe that the challenges he has faced pale in comparison to those faced by President Mandela," Valerie Jarrett, Obama's senior adviser, said in an interview this summer before the president made a trip to South Africa.

Mandela was hospitalized during Obama's visit, preventing a meeting between the two men. Obama did, however, meet with several members of Mandela's family and made an emotional visit to Robben Island, standing with his wife and two daughters in the tiny cell where the South African leader spent 18 of his 27 years in prison.

Obama and Mandela met in person only once, a hastily arranged 2005 meeting in a Washington hotel room when Obama was a U.S. senator. A photo of the meeting hangs in Obama's personal office at the White House, showing a smiling Mandela sitting on a chair, his legs outstretched, as the young senator reaches down to shake his hand. A copy of the photo also hangs in Mandela's office in Johannesburg.

The two men did speak occasionally by telephone, including after the 2008 election, when Mandela called Obama to congratulate him on his victory. The U.S. president called Mandela in 2010 after the South African leader's young granddaughter was killed in a car accident. Obama also wrote the introduction to Mandela's memoir, "Conversations with Myself."

Mandela had already shaped Obama's political beliefs well before their first encounter. As a student at Occidental College in Los Angeles, Obama joined protests against the school's investments during South Africa's apartheid era. In 1981, Obama focused his first public political speech on the topic.

"The day that he was released from prison gave me a sense of what human beings can do when they're guided by their hopes and not by their fears," Obama said in remarks shortly after Mandela died. "And like so many around the globe, I cannot fully imagine my own life without the example that Nelson Mandela set, and so long as I live I will do what I can to learn from him."

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Nelson Mandela Tributes

Copenhagen, Denmark. 8th December 2013 -- All people were welcome to join the Nelson Mandela tribute at Christians Church and this woman looks like she has a good time even though they a gathered because of sad circumstances. Gonzales Photo/Martin Flt. -- Hundreds gather in Christians Church in Copenhagen to pay tribute and honour the anti-apartheid revolutionary Nelson Mandela after his death. Image: Gonzales Photography, Copenhagen, Denmark

Apostolic church members sing as they celebrate the life of former president Nelson Mandela near his home in Qunu, South Africa, Sunday, Dec. 8, 2013. South Africans flocked to houses of worship for a national day of prayer and reflection to honor former President Nelson Mandela, starting planned events that will culminate in what is expected to be one of the biggest funerals in modern times. Image: AP

Church goers dance in a circle as they celebrate the life of former president Nelson Mandela near his home in Qunu, South Africa, Sunday, Dec. 8, 2013. South Africans flocked to houses of worship for a national day of prayer and reflection to honor former President Nelson Mandela, starting planned events that will culminate in what is expected to be one of the biggest funerals in modern times. Image: AP

Mourners attend an early morning church service in memory of Nelson Mandela at the Regina Mundi church, which became one of the focal points of the anti-apartheid struggle, in Soweto, Johannesburg, People in South Africa are taking part in a day of "prayer and reflection" for late President Nelson Mandela. Image: AP

 Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, left, Nelson Mandela's former wife, greets worshippers at the Bryanston Methodist Church in Bryanston suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa, Sunday Dec. 8, 2013. South Africa is readying itself for the arrival of a flood of world leaders for the memorial service and funeral for Nelson Mandela as thousands of mourners continued to flock to sites around the country Saturday to pay homage to the freedom struggle icon. Image: AP

Karen Chickerling of South Africa looks up at the statue of Nelson Mandela along with her daughter Kayla in front of the South African Embassy in Washington, DC Friday, December 6, 2013. Mandela died Thursday night at the age of 95. Image: Ken Cedeno

Vilakazi Street, Soweto, South Africa: South African children react to the passing of Nelson Mandela, signing their names and wishes on placards of the icon, outside his home in Vilakazi Street, Soweto. Image: Louis Gubb, Soweto, South Africa

Flowers seen below Nelson's statue at South Bank in London. -- Hundreds of floral tributes were laid by Nelson Mandela's statue at Parliament Square and outside the South African Embassay following the passing of the former president on the first day of national day of prayer held in South Africa.Date: Sunday, December 8, 2013. Image: David Mbiyu

At the South African Embassy in Brussels, Belgium people gather with flowers and text at the window of the embassy Sunday, December 8, 2013. Image: Sander de Wilde

Seattle, United States. 7th December 2013 -- A crowd of around 100 attend a candlelight vigil at the Seattle Center's International Fountain to honor the late Nelson Mandela. The former president of South Africa and anti-apartheid revolutionary died at the age of 95. -- Approximately one hundred people gathered at the International Fountain in Seattle to honor the late Nelson Mandela. The former president of South Africa and anti-apartheid revolutionary died on December 5, 2013, at the age of 95.Image: Ted Hammond

An unidentified man signs a book of condolences at the South African Embassy in Washington, DC Friday, December 6, 2013. Image: Ken Cedeno

Islamabad Journalist Pay Tribute to Mandela, Islamabad, Pakistan. 7th December 2013 -- Participants observed one minute of silence as they pay tribute to Mandela. AJK PM and leaders from AJK and PFUJ laid flowers on the Photo of Mandela and candles were lightened. -- Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) has termed the life and struggle of Nelson Mandela, as a symbol of all struggle for the cause of "freedom" and said, there is more to learn from his "Long Walk to Freedom, " than to mourn his death.Image: Taseen Farooq

Porscha Starlett Christmas Toy Drive

Tis the season to be Jolly and give Joyfully. Porscha Starr presents our 1st Annual Starrlett Christmas Toy Drive! This year, we have partnered with the Salvation Army to help spread Christmas cheer to less fortunate children and families. Join us Saturday, December 14th, 324 E Queen St, Inglewood, CA 90301 from 12noon-3pm and drop off a new toy. Unfortunately not every child will have a Merry Christmas however, with your help and support we can work to change that! An event for the entire family to participate in; join Porscha Starr at the 1st Annual Starrlett Christmas Toy Drive!

Tata Madiba The Great

Model Naomi Campbell embraces her hero Nelson Mandela. Date: February 1998.

Madiba, Father, Troublemaker - Mandela's Names

A message using Nelson Mandela's clan name "Madiba" and a term of affection "Tata" meaning "father", is scrawled on the window of a car parked in the street outside Mandela's old house in Soweto, Johannesburg, South Africa Friday, Dec. 6, 2013. South Africans of all races often referred to Nelson Mandela as simply "Madiba" or "Tata", terms of endearment that promoted a sense of familiarity for a towering figure who was widely revered.

JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA (ASSOCIATED PRESS) — South Africans of all races often referred to Nelson Mandela as simply "Madiba" or "Tata," terms of endearment that promoted a sense of familiarity for a towering figure who was widely revered.

The use of the more informal names reflected the personality of a man who could break the bounds of formality by cracking a joke, stopping a news conference to greet a child or strolling over to his neighbors for a "pop-in" visit.

The use of the names for a man who broke the shackles of apartheid, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and who became his country's first black president created a sense of intimacy for South Africans, since many considered him not only the father of their nation but also like a father or grandfather. Even South African media and officials often use Mandela's other names.

Here's a glance at what's in the names of Mandela, who died Thursday at age 95:

Madiba:

The name most commonly used by South Africans for Mandela is Madiba. Madiba is the name of the clan that Mandela belonged to and is derived from the name of a chief who ruled in the Transkei region in the 18th century, according to the Nelson Mandela Foundation. By using that name, South Africans expressed their respect for Mandela as the son of a traditional chief, but mostly it as an endearment, creating a sense of familiarity, like one friend would use another friend's nickname.

Tata:

In the language of Mandela's Xhosa tribe, the word simply means "father." Many South Africans adopted the term to show their affection and respect because they regard him as the father of their democratic nation. Some called him "Tata" also because they held him so dearly that they considered him one of their own family members.

Rolihlahla:

Mandela's father, who was a tribal chief in Transkei, a Xhosa homeland in the country's southeast, gave his son the name Rolihlahla at birth. In Xhosa it literally translates as "pulling the branch from a tree" but colloquially it means "troublemaker," according to the Nelson Mandela Foundation.
Nelson Mandela:

His universally known first name Nelson wasn't given to him until his first day of school by his teacher, according to his autobiography. Giving black South African children a Christian or more English-sounding name at the time was not unusual, a legacy of colonial days when rulers struggled to pronounce African names or viewed them as inferior. Mandela is his family's last name.

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Palestinians Remember Mandela As An Inspiration

Palestinian children pray next to a poster with a picture of late South African leader Nelson Mandela, during a special service in his honor at the Holy Family Church, in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Sunday Dec. 8, 2013. Palestinians mourned Mandela as a loyal champion of their cause, lighting candles for him in special church services on Sunday and holding up his picture in confrontations with Israeli troops in the West Bank.

RAMALLAH, WEST BANK (ASSOCIATED PRESS) — Palestinians mourned Nelson Mandela as their most loyal champion, lighting candles in special prayer services Sunday and holding his picture like a shield in confrontations with Israeli troops.

But the death of the South African leader who famously said that "our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians" also reminded many here of how far they are from establishing a state of their own.

U.S.-mediated talks between Israelis and Palestinians on the terms of such a state have reached their mid-way point and appear bogged down. "I don't think our leaders or the Israeli leaders or the American leaders will make peace here," Wael Shihadeh, 52, said Sunday while chopping eggplants in the kitchen of a Ramallah restaurant. Palestinians lack a leader of Mandela's caliber, he said.

Palestinian activists have compared Mandela's struggle against apartheid to theirs against Israeli occupation — a parallel Israel rejects — and some increasingly look to South Africa for help in pressure campaigns against Israel.

Many South Africans also equate the Israeli treatment of Palestinians with their former apartheid regime's abuse of blacks. Last year, South Africa's government decided that goods imported from Israeli West Bank settlements cannot not be labeled "product of Israel." In 2011, the University of Johannesburg became the world's first to impose an academic boycott on Israel.

In October, veteran anti-apartheid leader Ahmed Kathrada, who was convicted alongside Mandela in 1964, launched a campaign from Mandela's former prison cell for Marwan Barghouti. The Palestinian uprising leader was jailed 11 years ago and is serving five life terms after being convicted of a role in the uprising-related killings of four Israelis and a Greek monk.

Asked about the use of violence by the Palestinians, Kathrada noted that Mandela's African National Congress also turned to it at one point. "When everything failed, every peaceful method failed, we also had to resort to armed struggle, realizing that the main struggle will be where masses of people were involved," the 84-year-old said by phone from South Africa.

"We cannot prescribe to the Palestinian people how they should conduct their struggle," added Kathrada, who spent 26 years in prison, or a year less than Mandela, much of it in the same place. Palestinians want to establish a state in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem, lands Israel captured in 1967. More than 20 years of intermittent talks with Israel have been fruitless. A decade ago, Palestinians waged an armed uprising that was met by Israeli retaliation, and the fighting left more than 1,000 Israelis and more than 3,600 Palestinians dead.

The violence subsided after Mahmoud Abbas, who views negotiations with Israel as the preferred path to statehood, was elected Palestinian president in 2005, replacing one-time guerrilla leader Yasser Arafat. Two years later, Palestinians split politically, with the Islamic militant Hamas seizing Gaza, refusing to renounce violence and calling for an Islamic state in historic Palestine, including what is now Israel.

Mandela's ANC and Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization have cooperated closely since the 1960s, including in joint military training. Hanan Ashrawi of the PLO said ANC activists told their PLO colleagues they believed the Palestinians would reach their goal first. "The ANC would always tell us, 'when you are independent, when you are free, you mustn't forget us'," she said.

To Mandela, support for the Palestinians was "a personal commitment, a moral commitment," she said. Kathrada said that after Mandela's release from prison, then-U.S. President George H. W. Bush urged the anti-apartheid leader to cut ties with Arafat, Cuba's Fidel Castro and Libya's Moammar Gadhafi.

"Mr. Mandela's response was that when we came to you, the Americans, the British and other Western countries and asked for assistance, you called us terrorists," Kathrada said. Mandela told Bush that "it would be immoral and ungrateful" to break with old allies, Kathrada said.

Alon Liel, Israel's ambassador to South Africa from 1992-1994, said Mandela told him he would never forget Israel's close ties with South Africa's apartheid regime, but was willing to move forward. Mandela said South Africa would have normal and even good relations if Israel moves toward an agreement with the Palestinians, Liel recalled.

Mandela was eager to mediate. When Arafat and then-Israeli President Ezer Weizman attended Mandela's 1994 inauguration, Mandela arranged an impromptu meeting. Arafat and Weizman talked for three hours, Liel said, noting that "this was his (Mandela's) first working meeting as a president."

Mandela offered his services again in 1999, during a visit to Israel after he had already left the presidency. Liel said Israel's prime minister at the time, Ehud Barak, turned Mandela down, telling him that "you are so close to them (the Palestinians) and we need somebody who is balanced between the two sides."

Relations between Israel and South Africa were cool during long years of deadlock in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. Solly Tshivhula, a South African diplomat in Ramallah, said his country's relations with Israel are shaped by South Africa's empathy for the Palestinians.

"The complication in South Africa's relations with Israel, in the context of Palestine, is derived from the fact that we see the struggle of Palestine as similar to that of ours against apartheid ...," he said.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said both sides are working hard to improve the relationship. Palmor and other Israeli officials have rejected the portrayal of Israel's rule over the Palestinians as a type of apartheid.

Israel annexed east Jerusalem in 1967, while the West Bank remains under military occupation. Some 350,000 Jewish settlers live in more than 61 percent of the West Bank, in areas under sole Israeli control. The rest is home to some 2.2 million Palestinians and is run by Abbas' self-rule government. However, Israel restricts the Palestinians' trade and movement, citing security concerns.

Since Mandela died Thursday at the age of 95, Palestinians have remembered him in small gatherings. On Friday and Saturday, groups of protesters held up his picture in demonstrations against Israel's separation barrier in the West Bank, which eats up Palestinian farmland along its route, though Israel presents it as a security fence.

On Sunday, churches in three West Bank towns held special prayers for Mandela. In Ramallah's Holy Family Church, about 200 worshippers sang hymns as two children held candles in front of a large Mandela photo leaning against the pulpit.

South Africans Hold Day Of Prayer For Mandela

A Christian worshipper prays on a hill overlooking the city of Johannesburg, South Africa, Sunday, Dec. 8, 2013. South Africans flocked to houses of worship for a national day of prayer and reflection to honor former President Nelson Mandela, starting planned events that will culminate in what is expected to be one of the biggest funerals in modern times.

JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA (ASSOCIATED PRESS) — South Africans of all races flocked to houses of worship Sunday for a national day of prayer and reflection to honor Nelson Mandela as a large contingent of foreign dignitaries, including royalty, begin arriving in the country to pay their final respects to the liberation struggle icon.

The government said Sunday that 53 heads of state and government as well as a broad range of eminent persons had confirmed that they would be attending a national memorial service and state funeral for the country's first black and democratically-elected president. The memorial service is expected to be one of the biggest in modern times.

Hundreds attended the Regina Mundi Church that was at the epicenter of the Soweto township uprising in 1976 against white rule. The Rev. Sebastian J. Rossouw described Mandela as "moonlight," saying he offered a guiding light for South Africa. Hundreds of people attended the Mass.

"Madiba did not doubt the light," Rossouw said, referring to Mandela by his clan name. "He paved the way for a better future, but he cannot do it alone." During the service, worshippers offered special prayers for the anti-apartheid leader and lit a candle in his honor in front of the altar. Off to the side of the sanctuary was a black and white photo of Mandela, who died Thursday at age 95.

Mandela's ex-wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, joined one of his grandsons, Mandla Mandela, and South African President Jacob Zuma in a prayer service in a Methodist church in Johannesburg. "We felt it important that we should have a day where all of us as South Africans can come together and pray for our first democratic president and reflect on his legacy," Zuma said. "But it is also to pray for our nation ... to pray that we not forget some of the values he fought for."

Zuma said Mandela had forgiven even those who had kept him in prison for 27 years, and that he had opposed both white and black domination. Inside a small, hilltop church behind Mandela's property in the eastern village of Qunu, where he will be buried next Sunday, about 50 people held a raucous, celebratory service. A man in a blue robe set the tempo by banging on a goat-skin drum. Men, clapping, formed a tight huddle as mostly barefoot women danced on the cement floor in a circle around them.

Joshua Mzingelwa, the leader of Morians Episcopal Apostolic Church, delivered a loud, throaty sermon. "There is still hope in the hardship that you are facing daily," Mzingelwa told the congregation. In an affluent and predominantly white suburb of the capital Pretoria, parishioners prayed for Mandela at what was once a worship center for pro-apartheid government and business leaders. They prayed in silence as a picture of Mandela was beamed onto the wall above the church's pulpit, the event starkly highlighting the enormous changes that have come to this country.

Pastor Niekie Lamprecht of the Dutch Reformed Church of Pretoria East said the congregation's overwhelmingly white 1,600 parishioners have changed, and that Mandela himself was the driving force. The idea of showing a picture of him inside the church two decades ago would have been unthinkable.

"What helped the white people of South Africa was Mr. Mandela's attitude," Lamprecht said. "He said, 'Let's forgive,' and he forgave. That created a space for people to feel safe ... at a time when the expectation was that there was going to be a war."

A service was also held at St. George's Cathedral in Cape Town, where a prayer was said for a man whose journey from prisoner to president inspired the world. "May his long walk to freedom be enjoyed and realized in our time by all of us," worshippers said in a prayer.

Ahmed Kathrada, who was sentenced to life in prison with Mandela in 1964, said he was informed shortly before Mandela's death on Thursday night that his old friend was about to die. Kathrada said Graca Machel, Mandela's wife, conveyed the message to him through another person that "the doctors have said, 'Anytime.'"

A national memorial service for the man who, as the country's first black president forged a new multiracial, democratic South Africa, will be held at a Johannesburg stadium on Tuesday. Mandela's body will lie in state at the Union Buildings, the seat of government in Pretoria, from Wednesday to Friday, followed by his funeral and burial in Qunu next Sunday.

Among those who have already indicated that they will be coming to South Africa are U.S. President Barack Obama and his two predecessors, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon will also travel to Johannesburg for the memorial service.

Other leaders and dignitaries who have confirmed that they are coming include French President Francois Hollande, Brazilian President Dilma Rouseff, Cyprus' Parliamentary Speaker, Yiannakis Omirou, Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt, Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark, Haitian Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe, Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg and Crown Prince Haakon of Norway.

King Willem-Alexander and Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans will attend on behalf of the Netherlands.

Associated Press writers Alan Clendenning in Pretoria, Jason Straziuso in Qunu and Christopher Torchia in Cape Town contributed to this report.

Mandela's Jailer Praises The Anti-Apartheid Icon

In this image from TV, Christo Brand the Robben Island jailer talks to The Associated Press Saturday Dec. 7, 2013, in his Cape Town home, about former South African President Nelson Mandela who was assigned to guard from 1978 until his release in 1990. Mandela was convicted of treason and sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964. The former Robben Island warder Brand said "I want to say Mandela was my prisoner. He became my friend, and was also like a father to me". During the interview Brand recounted a meeting with Mandela during political negotiations to build a new constitution for South Africa, when Mandela saw Brand and said to the assembled members of parliament making a big announcement to everyone, "You know who is this person? This person was my warden, this person was my friend." I feel very humble, I feel very small at that moment said Brand, during a photo session Brand stood on the side but Mandela said, "No, no, you must stand next to me, we belong together."

CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA (ASSOCIATED PRESS) — He was with Nelson Mandela during all those years the anti-apartheid icon was imprisoned on Robben Island. And, like millions around the world, he has been hit hard by Mandela's death.

Yet this South African was not one of Mandela's fellow prisoners. Christo Brand was his jailer. The two men — the black political prisoner and the white Afrikaans warden — forged an unlikely but enduring friendship.

They last met about two years ago when Brand, now in his 50s, brought his wife, son and grandson to see Mandela in Cape Town in a Sunday afternoon visit that lasted nearly three hours. They had "nice chats about the past, about his family. He wanted to pick up my grandchild, to hold him, which he was a little bit shy to go to him. You could see he really reached out for touching a child at that moment," Brand recalled.

"When I got the message when he passed away, it was very sad for me," Brand told The Associated Press on Saturday. "But I think he was successful and he did what he wanted to do. I wanted him to go in peace and I am thinking of the family today, what they go through."

Brand started to work on Robben Island in 1978 when he was 18 and Mandela was 60. Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in prison on Robben Island. Eventually Brand grew to like Mandela and smuggled in special treats like bread and Mandela's favorite hair pomade. Brand even sneaked in Mandela's infant granddaughter so that the prisoner could hold her.

For his part, Mandela encouraged Brand to continue his education and maintained an interest in him and his family. Years later, when Mandela was president, he took special care to single out Brand for recognition while Brand was a lowly civil servant while South Africa's new constitution was being drafted. Mandela flew in by helicopter and entered the room where members of parliament were debating the new constitution, said Brand.

Mandela went around the room shaking hands with parliamentarians but when he saw Brand, who was distributing documents, Mandela lifted his arms and warmly greeted him. "He immediately made a big announcement to everyone: 'You know who is this person? This person was my warden, this person was my friend.'" Brand said he felt very humble and proud at that moment. After that when the parliamentarians went out for a group photo, Mandela insisted that Brand be in the photo. "He said 'No, no. You must stand next to me, we belong together.'"

Brand once again works on Robben Island which is no longer a prison but a bustling tourist attraction. He and other former guards and prisoners tell visitors about the new South Africa's racial reconciliation.

Brand said he shared a joke with Mandela about his final resting place. "I say to Mandela that we must bury you on Robben Island. Then he just laughed. He said 'Why? For tourist attraction?' He said 'You should have made money. But I think I must go to Qunu.' That was him making a joke."

Meldrum contributed from Johannesburg

Few Heirs Apparent To Mandela's Symbol Of Freedom

This combination of 2013 file photos shows, from left, Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi; Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teenager shot by the Taliban for promoting education for girls, and Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama. The passing of Nelson Mandela leaves a waning number of global figures representing freedom and resilience against oppression - and a changing world that makes it harder for anyone to approach Mandela’s iconic power.

(ASSOCIATED PRESS) The passing of Nelson Mandela leaves a waning number of global figures representing freedom and resilience against oppression — and a changing world that makes it harder for anyone to approach Mandela's iconic power.

There are a few whose trials have made them symbols of freedom, including the former political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar, the Dalai Lama and, more recently, Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani schoolgirl turned women's rights activist .

But Mandela, the black revolutionary who emerged from 27 years in prison to embrace his white oppressors and lead a new South Africa, may be one of the last of a breed for all sorts of reasons — including the circumstances of his heroism, his extraordinary success and the onset of an age when heroes' foibles are often exposed.

"He lived and worked in a context and historical period where his extraordinary individual qualities could help make change in his country and ripple throughout the world," said Daniel Calengaret, executive vice president of the Freedom House, a watchdog group working to expand freedom around the world.
"It's hard to think of someone who was both an iconic dissident figure and was actually central to building a new system," Calengaret said. Mandela is often mentioned in the same breath as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., who also changed nations through nonviolence. Yet Gandhi and King were killed before their dreams were realized.

Suu Kyi, the Myanmar pro-democracy leader, was imprisoned by the military regime for 15 years before she was released and won a parliamentary seat. Yet she battles in a political arena lacking the stark racism of South African apartheid, which deprived the black majority of equal rights.

"She stands for the end of a dictatorship, not the end of a racial system," said Dores Cruz, a University of Denver anthropology professor. Cruz said that the dismantling of communism by the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev is comparable to Mandela ending apartheid. But Gorbachev did not suffer personal persecution to do it.

She noted that Mandela's image was carefully constructed for political purposes in pre-Internet South Africa, then burnished over the years by international media, musicians and Hollywood. "The impact that has had on the historical imagination, you probably won't find that in anybody," Cruz said. "No one has the same iconic image or same historical status."

The Dalai Lama, a Buddhist figure seeking the nonviolent restoration of Tibet's independence from China, has lived in exile for more than 60 years. And there is an ethnic or racial aspect to the Tibetan struggle, as China seeks to wipe out its traditional culture and replace it with that of the Han Chinese.

"Like Mandela, the Dalai Lama represents the decades-long suffering of his people. And he articulates a peaceful possibility in response to violence and aggression," said William Edelglass, a Marlboro College philosophy professor.

"Like Mandela, he inspires us to the better angels of our nature," Edelglass said. "He reminds us of how we really want to be." But at age 78, with China firmly in control, the Dalai Lama is unlikely to see a free Tibet. And his Buddhist religion sets him apart from Mandela, who enjoyed a type of secular sainthood that transcended religious divides.

Malala, the 16-year-old Pakistani girl, achieved global prominence last year when the Taliban tried to kill her for advocating the equality and education of women. After Mandela's death, she called him "my leader."
In the past, other politicians suffered to reform oppressive regimes — Lech Walesa in Poland or Vaclav Havel in Czechoslovakia. But the peak of their careers came at the moment when the old regime crumbled, Calingaret observed.

"In a sense Mandela's greatest achievements were as president," he said. "He was on top, he could do anything he wanted, and he chose to push for reconciliation and inclusiveness." Mandela's rise might have been complicated had it happened during the Internet age. Mandela had his share of flaws, including infidelity and a past embrace of violence, but they were overlooked. The volume and speed of the information traveling around the world today makes it impossible for a leader to climb without his or her every weakness being magnified.

"One of the things about Mandela that makes him unique, all those years in prison, he couldn't be really doing bad things during that time. And he lived prior to universal access," said Edelglass. He sees the potential for another Mandela in the fight for democracy in China, "but we would know everything about that person, everything they had ever done wrong."

"I wouldn't want to say there are no more (figures like Mandela) coming. I hope there are more coming," Edelglass said. "But it's a much more complicated world." Roger Levine, who grew up in South Africa and now teaches courses on it as a history professor at the Sewanee: The University of the South, said Mandela became such a potent symbol because he experienced all the tribulations of South Africa itself. But the world no longer builds up politicians as the very embodiments of their nations' struggles, he said.

Mandela was a product of a Cold War world: good vs. evil, us vs. them, black vs. white. "Now," Levine said, "it's a whole lot harder to say who is the us and who is the them." "No one is going to suggest that there aren't instances around the world where we have conflict between good and evil," Levine said. "But there are fewer opportunities to say you're on the right side, because it's a little bit less obvious what the right side of something might be."

Jesse Washington is reachable at http:www.twitter.com/jessewashington

Yemen Says Saudis Behind Attack

 Map locates attack in Sanaa, Yemen.; 2c x 5 inches; 96.3 mm x 127 mm;

ADEN, Yemen (AP) — Saudi militants were behind the massive car bombing and assault on Yemen's military headquarters that killed more than 50 people, including foreigners, investigators said in a preliminary report released Friday. Al-Qaida claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was retaliation for U.S. drone strikes that have killed dozens of the terror network's leaders.

The attack — the deadliest in Sanaa since May 2012 — marked an escalation in the terror network's battle to undermine the U.S.-allied government and destabilize the impoverished Arab nation despite the drone strikes and a series of U.S.-backed military offensive against it. U.S. forces also have been training and arming Yemeni special forces, and exchanging intelligence with the central government.

Military investigators described a two-stage operation, saying heavily armed militants wearing army uniforms first blew up a car packed with 500 kilograms (more than 1,100 pounds) of explosives near an entrance gate, then split into groups that swept through a military hospital and a laboratory, shooting at soldiers, doctors, nurses, doctors and patients.

Officials earlier said 11 militants were killed, including the suicide bomber who drove the car. It was not clear if the 12th attacker was captured or escaped. The investigative committee led by Yemen's Chief of Staff Gen. Ahmed al-Ashwal, said militants shot the guards outside the gates of the military hospital, allowing the suicide bomber to drive the car inside, but a gunfight forced him to detonate his explosives before reaching his target. It said the 12 militants killed, included Saudis.

Two military officials told The Associated Press that wounded soldiers had told them the assailants who stormed the hospital separated out the foreigners and shot everybody in the head. Other military officials said American security agents were helping with the investigations, but that could not be confirmed. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to brief reporters.

Yemeni commandos and other security forces besieged the militants before they could reach the ministry's main building, preventing them from going further than the ministry's entrance gate. All the attackers were killed by 4:30 p.m. Thursday, according to the committee.

Yemeni security forces launched a manhunt in the capital to find the perpetrators, sparking gunbattles that killed five suspected militants and a Yemeni commando, officials said. The committee, which sent its report to Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, did not explain how it came to its conclusions The report was read on state TV and a copy was obtained by The Associated Press. Hadi met Friday with the U.N. envoy to Yemen Jamal Benomar to discuss the attack. He said that "a number of assailants have been arrested," without elaborating. He added that the "criminals will not escape justice."

The report also raised the death toll to 56 and said more than 200 people were wounded. The foreigners killed included two aid workers from Germany, two doctors from Vietnam, two nurses from the Philippines and a nurse from India, according to Yemen's Supreme Security Commission.

But a spokesman for the Philippines' Department of Foreign Affairs, Raul Hernandez, said Friday that seven Filipinos were killed in the attack, including a doctor and nurses, while 11 others were wounded. The victims were among 40 Filipino workers in the hospital. Hernandez said that the Philippines' honorary consul reported that the others survived by pretending to be dead.

It was not immediately possible to reconcile the conflicting accounts. But officials from the military hospital said Friday that at least 10 foreigners had been killed. Germany's foreign ministry spokesman Martin Schaefer also announced Friday that German employees of aid groups doing work on behalf of the German government have been ordered to leave Yemen "as quickly as possible" and "until further notice."

Schafer also said the German embassy will continue to operate with reduced staff and "corresponding security measures." Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, as the group is known, is the product of a merger by the group's Yemeni and Saudi branches after a crackdown in the powerful neighboring kingdom. Among its leaders is another Saudi, Ibrahim al-Asiri. The drone strikes and military offensives that began in June 2012 have driven militants from southern strongholds they had seized a year earlier, during Yemen's political turmoil amid the Arab Spring.

AQAP's media arm, al-Mallahem, said on its Twitter account Friday that it had targeted the Defense Ministry building because it "accommodates drone control rooms and American experts." It said security headquarters used by the Americans in their war are "legitimate targets."

The United States considers the Yemeni al-Qaida branch to be the most active in the world and it has escalated drone attacks against the militants in Yemen, killing many militant leaders, including the group's No. 2 figure Saeed al-Shihri, a Saudi who was died of wounds sustained in a strike in November 2012.

Associated Press writer Maggie Michael in Cairo contributed to this report.