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PRETORIA — With virtually no fresh information about the precarious state of Nelson Mandela’s health for four days, South Africans Tuesday feared his condition could be even worse than officially acknowledged.
“There are just so many rumours and nobody will tell us anything,” said Kgopotso Nkoe, a law student at Pretoria University. “We know nothing and it is frustrating. We want to know because we love him as a man who chose peace over revenge and because he did so much for our people.”
Ms. Nkoe and her friend, Faith Sithole, had come to the Mediclinic Heart Hospital to learn more than what the country had been told in three terse bulletins since Saturday, when Mr. Mandela was rushed to hospital in the wee hours.
As of late Tuesday, all that had been officially announced was South Africa’s revered first black president, the man who vanquished apartheid, was in intensive care in “serious, but stable condition.”
Despite the dearth of official news or perhaps because of it, the frail 94-year-old statesman’s anxious countrymen had been speculating — often wildly — about his health since he was hospitalized for the fourth time in seven months for urgent treatment for a recurring lung infection.
There was a growing sense of dread that this time was somehow different for “Madiba,” the clan name Mr. Mandela often goes by.
The sombre sentiment could be partly explained by the use for the first time of the word “serious” to describe his condition, and by the fact that never before during his previous illnesses had so many television satellite uplink trucks and dishes been parked outside the hospital.
Another factor weighing on South Africans has been the steady parade of grim family members, who once again visited the Mediclinic Tuesday, including one of his daughters who flew in from Buenos Aires to be at his side.
But what has had the greatest resonance by far were remarks Sunday by Andrew Mokete Mlangeni, who spent years as a political prisoner with Mr. Mandela on Robben Island.
“The family must release him so that God may have his own way,” he said in an interview with the South African Sunday Times.
These words held special meaning because in South Africa’s tribal culture, the sick cannot die unless their family lets them go so they can peacefully surrender to death.
“As much as we would like to deny it, it’s time to let go. We must just accept it,” said Ms. Sithole, who is studying to be a town planner.
For the rest of this editorial, click here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/06/12/south-africans-worried-nelson-andelas-health-more-dire-than-officials-saying/