Winnie Mandela dies

Nomzamo Winifred (Winnie) Madikizela-Mandela‚ a stalwart in the fight against apartheid‚ died yesterday at the age of 81. Her assistant, Zodwa Zwane‚ confirmed the struggle veteran’s death on Monday afternoon.
Two members of the Mandela family confirmed that Madikizela-Mandela had been admitted to a Johannesburg hospital yesterday. Her condition and the cause of her illness were unknown.
In January, she was admitted to Milpark Hospital with a kidney infection and exhaustion.
Born in Bizana in the Eastern Cape in 1936‚ she moved to Johannesburg to study social work after matriculating.
She met lawyer and anti-apartheid activist Nelson Mandela in 1957 and they were married a year later. They had two children together.
However‚ her marriage life with Mandela was short-lived‚ as he was arrested in 1963 and sentenced to life imprisonment for treason. Mandela was eventually released in 1990.
During Mandela’s time in prison‚ Madikizela-Mandela was not spared the reach of the apartheid forces. She was placed under house arrest and at one time banished to Brandfort‚ a town in the Free State.
In 1969‚ Madikizela-Mandela became one of the first detainees under Section 6 of the notorious Terrorism Act of 1967. She was detained for 18 months in solitary confinement in a condemned cell at Pretoria Central Prison before being charged under the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950.
Her life was not without controversy.
In 1991‚ she was convicted of kidnapping and being an accessory to assault of Stompie Seipei‚ a young activist who was killed by a member of her bodyguards‚ the Mandela United Football Club.
Madikizela-Mandela’s bodyguards had abducted Seipei‚ 14‚ in 1989‚ along with three other youths‚ from the home of Methodist minister Paul Verryn.
Her six-year jail sentence was reduced to a fine and a two-year suspended sentence on appeal.
Her marriage to Mandela began to flounder a few years after his release.
A letter she purportedly wrote to her young lover found its way into the newspapers.
The couple divorced in 1996‚ 37 years after their marriage.
TIMESLIVE