- JOHANNESBURG - The only surviving
son of former president Nelson Mandela died of Aids "an ordinary disease".
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- A few hours after Makgatho Mandela, 54, died in the Linksfield
Park clinic in Johannesburg on Thursday morning, the former president spoke
out over his son's illness and asked the country to break the silence surrounding
HIV/Aids.
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- Surrounded by his wife, Graca Machel, daughter, Makaziwe
Mandela, and doctor Lindiwe Sisulu, family friend and minister of housing,
Mandela said: "A member of my family died because of Aids."
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- "I have been saying for more than three years that
we should speak openly about HIV/Aids and not hide it away. It is the only
way in which it will become an ordinary disease - just like TB (tuberculosis)
and just like cancer.
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- Frowned upon
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- "If we speak about it, people will stop thinking
that it is something people will go to hell for and never see heaven."
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- Mandela said some of his friends frowned upon it when
he openly spoke about his prostate cancer. Even when he had tuberculosis
on Robben Island, his friends knew and they could support him.
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- "There is no point in hiding a disease that makes
you suffer."
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- "If you hide it, you still have to go to the doctor.
The doctor has assistants who will start whispering: 'Did you know? Mandela's
son died of Aids.'"
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- "That would have left a bad impression."
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- His campaign against the stigma and silence surrounding
Aids has nothing to do with his son's battle against the disease. "When
I started the campaign, I had no idea that it (Aids) would affect a member
of my family as well. I merely laid down a general principal: We must not
hide HIV/Aids away. Even Aids is an ordinary disease."
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- Mandela mentioned on Thursday that judge president of
Gauteng, Bernard Ngoepe, accepted his son as a lawyer. He did not want
to say anything more about him.
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- Makgatho Mandela went to school in Swaziland and Orlando
East and studied at the University of Natal.
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- He was an apprentice lawyer at the firm Webber Wentzel
Bowens, lawyer at the firm of Mandela's close friend, Ishmail Ayoob, and
later worked for Standard Bank's legal section.
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- A loving father
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- In his vision as chairperson of the firm Health Empowerment
Solutions, Makgatho wrote: "To be successful in the global family,
Africa must be productive. Do be productive, people must be healthy."
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- Mandla Mandela, Makgatho's eldest son, said his father
helped him and his three brothers, Ndaba, Mbuso and Andile, to find their
Mandela family roots.
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- "My father was a loving father. He was the pillar
from where we gained our strength. He taught his sons about strict discipline.
We will remember him as a man of unbelievable strength."
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- A memorial service for Makgatho Mandela will be held
on Tuesday.
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