Mandela, Nelson Rolihlahla (1918– )

Former president of South Africa Nelson Mandela and British Labour politician Tony Blair. Mandela and Blair are seen here exchanging a few words during a meeting in London. Nelson Mandela was released from prison in 1990 and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993.

South African politician and lawyer, and the country's first post-apartheid president 1994–99. He was president of the African National Congress (ANC) 1991–97. Imprisoned from 1964, as organizer of the then banned ANC, he became a symbol of unity for the worldwide anti-apartheid movement. In 1990 he was released and, following the first universal-suffrage elections in 1994, was sworn in as South Africa's first post-apartheid president after the ANC won 63% of the vote in universal-suffrage elections. He stepped down as president in 1999 and was succeeded by ANC president, Thabo Mbeki. In 1993 he shared the Nobel Prize for Peace with South African president F W de Klerk for their work towards dismantling apartheid and negotiating the transition to a democracy.

In February 1990 Mandela was released from prison, the ban on the ANC having been lifted, and in 1991 the final apartheid laws were repealed. In 1991 Mandela was elected to the presidency of the ANC and the ANC opened constitutional negotiations with the government about a multiracial future for South Africa. Following the elections in 1994, Mandela's new government set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate abuses under the former apartheid regime. De Klerk and his Nationalist party withdrew from the coalition in May 1996. Mandela stepped down as ANC president in 1997 and retired from active politics in 1999. In 2000 he became UN mediator for the civil war in Burundi, achieving a peace deal. He also raised money for the Mandela Foundation, to build schools and clinics. In June 2004, he retired formally from public life to spend more time with his family.

Born near Umtata, Transkei, the son of a councillor to the local paramount chief, Mandela was brought up to be a chief. He was expelled from college in 1940 after taking part in a strike, but continued to train as a lawyer. In 1944, he founded the ANC Youth League, with Walter Sisulu and Oliver Tambo (with whom he later formed the country's first black law practice).

Mandela's outspoken opposition to the government's racist apartheid policies led to his arrest in 1952 under the Suppression of Communism Act. Charged with treason in 1956, he was acquitted in 1961. After the 1960 Sharpeville massacre of 69 blacks demonstrating against the apartheid laws, the ANC was banned. Mandela was forced underground and became commander-in-chief of the ANC's armed wing. He orchestrated a three-day national strike in 1961, but was arrested in August 1962. Despite a memorable four-hour defence speech at his trial, in 1964 he was given a life sentence on charges of sabotage and plotting to overthrow the government.

Mandela's first 18 years in jail were spent on Robben Island; in 1982 he was transferred to Pollsmoor Prison, Cape Town. A worldwide ‘Release Mandela’ campaign was launched in the 1980s. In 1985 President P W Botha offered Mandela a conditional release but Mandela refused to compromise, and it was another five years before he was finally released.

Mandela was married to the South African civil-rights activist Winnie Mandela from 1958 to 1996. In 1998 he married Graca Machel, the widow of the Mozambique nationalist leader, Samora Machel. Mandela's autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom (1994) was widely acclaimed.