The world's most famous prisoner celebrated his 70th birthday last week in Pollsmoor Prison, outside Cape Town. Isolated from the other inmates, Nelson Mandela refused the government's offer of a special six-hour birthday visit from his family as a way of protesting the plight of thousands of black activists jailed in South Africa. Meanwhile, Pretoria ordered roadblocks around the prison and clamped down on tributes to Mandela, including outdoor meetings, a private tea party and a concert at the University of Cape Town, which ended with the arrival of riot police in gas masks.
To millions of his black countrymen and...
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