I read this and found it quite profound:
I heard someone say today there were Five Mandibas just like there were three Malcolms. For the latter, Malcolm Little, Malcolm X and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. For the former, Mandiba before Robben Island, Mandiba on Robben Island, Mandiba… after release from Robben Island, Mandiba as President and Mandiba as Former President.
What I’ve seen over the past few days, is an emphasis by the N.E.W.S. on the “Lion in Winter” or Mandiba primarily as kindly, forgiving, dancing, old and compliant. I’ve also seen those who focus on Mandiba after his release from Robben Island refer to him as the “sell-out” Mandiba. Still others prefer the First Mandiba who gave orders to bomb and kill white South Afrikaners in the struggle against Apartheid—Mandiba the Revolutionary.
Mandiba was ALL of these and not one of them. Anyone who lives to be 95 changes ideology, perspectives and politics. W.E.B. Du Bois once referred to Marcus Garvey as a “a little, fat, black man, ugly…with a big head.”, but praised him in later life as a great Pan Afrikanist. Mandiba himself, said he was not a perfect man, none of Us are, and in describing himself as imperfect, he has done what many of Us are unwilling to do—engage in healthy self-critique rather than persist in exaggerated notions of who We are.
At this time I choose to embrace all Five of the Mandibas, revolutionary, imprisoned, released, President and the Lion in Winter. He was all of these and I hope Our view of him is comprehensive rather than picking one of them and thus creating a narrow view of the total person.
Just my $.02…
Ray Winbush
afrospear.wordpress.com 
The Uruguayan writer and activist Eduardo Galeano in a phone conference puts it clearly when he says that in this universal mourning the world is having today, there are too many hypocrites.
Eduardo Galeano is upset that Nelson Mandela was just recently taking off the United States official terrorist list in 2008 by George Bush, even after Mandela was released from prison and had been elected president of South Africa.
Galeano says Mandela was placed in this terrorist cell and labeled a terrorist when in no way was he ever a terrorist.
Galeano believes the United States owes the world an apology for lying about Nelson Mandela and placing him on an official terrorist list for 60 years.
My feelings on Nelson Mandela is that Mandela was a very complex individual who went through an enormous transformation during his lifetime.
We also should not forget how conservatives here protected Afrikaners’ interests by voting against sanctions, and trying to interfere in black South Africans future by courting Chief Buthelelzi who they had preferred because he had accepted and recognized these bantustans. Buthelezi was soft on the whites during apartheid. Buthelezi also was the one instigating the violence in the townships.
This is something I will never forget.
Remember no country had accepted these so called bantustans (homelands) the white Afrikaners wanted to give blacks.
Frankly, I was disappointed with how Winnie Mandela was treated in the end, as if she had been a troublemaker, when she was one of the many real victims of apartheid. The system of apartheid destroyed many black lives in South Africa.
My hope and dream is for all South Africans to live in peace because I firmly believe that after Nelson Mandela left his prison cell, he understood that as a leader , the peaceful way was the only option to avoid blood been spilled all over the beloved country.
I will end with the Xhosa/ Zulu song of Senzeni Na
translated as
What have we done? Is it our sin to be black?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fDU1PYWT8A
Cordiales saludos.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNpXUC391vc