American president Obama, who has often
referred to South Africa's first black president as his source of inspiration
said that Mandela belonged to the ages
Reuters
Washington: America's first black president, Barack Obama,
hailed Nelson Mandela as a source of personal inspiration whose struggle against
racism in South Africa jump-started his own involvement in politics.
Speaking in the White House press room shortly after the
announcement of Mandela's death, a somber-looking Obama said the 95-year-old
leader left a legacy of freedom and peace.
"I am one of the countless millions who drew inspiration from
Nelson Mandela's life. My very first political action, the first thing I ever
did that involved an issue or a policy or politics, was a protest against
apartheid," Obama said.
"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," he said.
Obama, the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from
Kansas, has long referred to Mandela as an inspiration. A picture of the two men
together hangs in the family residence at the White House, next to a photograph
of Mandela with first lady Michelle Obama and the two Obama daughters, taken
when they went to South Africa two and a half years ago.
The president said he read Mandela's writings as a young man.
The day Mandela was released from prison gave Obama "a sense of what human
beings can do when they're guided by their hopes and not by their fears," he
said.
The Obamas went to Cape Town and Johannesburg during an Africa
tour in June but did not visit the ailing leader, who was in the hospital at the
time. They toured the Robben Island prison where Mandela had been held and stood
in his cell. The president and the first lady also met with Mandela's
family.
Mandela died in his Johannesburg home on Thursday after a
prolonged lung infection.
"He achieved more than could be expected of any man. Today, he
has gone home," Obama said. "We have lost one of the most influential,
courageous, and profoundly good human beings that any of us will share time with
on this earth. He no longer belongs to us - he belongs to the ages."
During his Africa trip, Obama urged the continent to follow
Mandela's example, and he said on Thursday that the former leader's legacy would
endure.
"To the people of South Africa, we draw strength from the
example of renewal, and reconciliation, and resilience that you made real,"
Obama said. "A free South Africa at peace with itself - that's an example to the
world, and that's Madiba's legacy to the nation he loved," he said, referring to
Mandela by his clan name.
Obama is expected to go to South Africa for Mandela's
funeral.
"We will not likely see the likes of Nelson Mandela again," he
said. "So it falls to us as best we can to forward the example that he set: to
make decisions guided not by hate, but by love; to never discount the difference
that one person can make; to strive for a future that is worthy of his
sacrifice."
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