South Africans on Monday welcomed Nelson Mandela’s discharge from a hospital after nearly three months of treatment amid concerns that his health remains so poor that he still must receive intensive care at home.
An ambulance returned the 95-year-old leader of the anti-apartheid movement to his home in the leafy Johannesburg neighborhood of Houghton on Sunday. The office of South African President Jacob Zuma said Mandela remains in critical and sometimes unstable condition and will receive the same level of care that he did in the hospital, administered by the same doctors.
Authorities kept a large contingent of journalists away from the entrance to Mandela’s house, and police patrolled tree-lined streets in the area. Some grandchildren and other relatives of the former leader visited the home, but did not comment to the media.
When Mandela was hospitalized, many people left written tributes outside the perimeter wall of his home, turning the area into a makeshift shrine where people sang, prayed and left messages of support for a man who steered South Africa from white minority rule to democratic rule in a spirit of reconciliation that inspired the world.
“If he’s back at home, I’m feeling free,” said Harrison Phiri, a gardener. “He’s the father of the nation.”
Thembisa Mbolambi, another Johannesburg resident, also expressed satisfaction that Mandela had left the hospital in Pretoria, describing him as “the man who offered himself for us.”
The Star, a South African newspaper, carried a headline that read, “Madiba At Home,” referring to Mandela by his clan name. The newspaper noted that “worries over infection persist.”
A headline in The New Age newspaper was more upbeat: “World joy for Mandela.”
Mandela was admitted to the hospital on June 8 for what the government described as a recurring lung infection. Legal papers filed by his family said he was on life support, and many South Africans feared he was close to death.
One of Mandela’s daughters, Makaziwe Mandela, said as she left her father’s home that the family was “happy that he is home.”
Another Mandela family member, grandson Mandla Mandela, said the former president’s return home was a “day of celebration.”
Madiba’s discharge was “particularly heartening because it flies in the face of those who have been busy spreading lies that he was in a ‘vegetative state’ and just waiting for his support machines to be switched off,” the South African Press Association quoted Mandla Mandela as saying.
Mandla Mandela, the oldest male Mandela heir, has feuded with family members over the burial site of the anti-apartheid leader’s three deceased children and it was unclear whether his remarks reflected the views of other relatives.
The African National Congress, South Africa’s ruling party, welcomed the hospital discharge of its former leader.
“We believe that receiving treatment at home will afford him continuous support from his family and loved ones,” it said in a statement.
The government has released few details about Mandela’s condition, citing patient confidentiality and appealing for Mandela’s privacy and dignity to be respected. But rumors and unconfirmed reports about Mandela’s health have persisted on social media and other forums, fueled in part by the family feud.
Mandela has been particularly vulnerable to respiratory problems since contracting tuberculosis during his 27-year imprisonment. The bulk of that period was spent on Robben Island, a prison off the coast of Cape Town where Mandela and other apartheid-era prisoners spent part of the time toiling in a limestone quarry.
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