Nelson Mandela's remains arrived in his childhood village in eastern South Africa today for a traditional burial tomorrow, bringing down the curtain on ten days of national mourning and memorial events for the anti-apartheid icon.
An air force plane carrying Mandela's casket landed at Mthatha and the cortege drove through the streets of the town before reaching Qunu, about 31 km away, where he spent much of his childhood.
The casket, accompanied by senior clan and family members, was greeted at Mthatha airport by a military guard of honour. To solemn music, the coffin draped in a South African flag was moved by soldiers and placed in a hearse to begin the road journey.
People who had travelled for hours thronged the road leading to Qunu, singing and dancing as Mandela T-shirts were handed out. Local people were invited to form a human chain to pay their respects along the route to Qunu.
Mandela, who died on December 5 at the age of 95 after a protracted illness, will be buried tomorrow in a state funeral incorporating burial rites of his Xhosa tribe.
Ahead of the burial, the coffin will be kept overnight in the grounds of the royal house of Thembu in Qunu. The Thembu community will conduct a traditional ceremony in a specially erected giant white marquee.
Around 4,500 accredited guests will be at the funeral and about a tenth of them, including members of the Mandela family, will allowed to go to the actual burial site a short distance from the marquee.
In a surprise development ahead of the funeral, Mandela's close friend Archbishop Desmond Tutu said he will not attend the burial though he wanted to, as he had not been invited.
"Much as I would have loved to attend the service to say a final farewell to someone I loved and treasured, it would have been disrespectful to Tata (Mandela) to gate-crash what was billed as a private family funeral," Tutu said in a statement, with his office declining further comment.
Critics have claimed that Tutu was being victimised by either the African National Congress (ANC) or the Mandela family or both because he was very vocal in recent months in criticising President Jacob Zuma, the ANC, and Mandela's relatives who have been feuding in court over his inheritance.
Earlier, a Hercules C-130 transport aircraft, escorted by two Gripen fighter jets, took off from from Waterkloof airbase for Mthatha after a farewell ceremony organised by the ANC. The occasion was the party's final tribute to the man who demolished apartheid and brought it to power.
