August 18, 2013

Mandela Still a Fighter

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Richmond Free Press

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - World hero Nelson Mandela’shealth is slowly recovering buthe remains in critical condition,South Africa’s government statedSunday in its first update on hishealth in nearly two weeks.

The 95-year-old anti-apartheid leader and former South Africa president has been in a Pretoria hospital for two months for treatment of a recurrent lung infection.

“The former president is making a slow but steady improvement,” South Africa’s President said in a statement, adding Mandela still remained in a critical condition. Mandela’s youngest daughter told state broadcaster SABC that her father’s health was improving daily and he was able to sit up for minutes at a time.

Mandela became South Africa’s first democratically elected president in all-race elections in 1994 that marked the end of the apartheid system.He spent 27 years in prison under white minority rule, including18 years at the notorious Robben Island penal colony. His lung infection dates back to his time on the winds wept island, where he and other prisoners were forced to work in a limestone quarry.