Life After Prison 

After about thirty years, the ANC (African National Congress), and the PAC (Pan Africanist Congress) were un-banned on February 2, 1990. Nine days later, on February 11, 1990, Nelson Mandela was released from prison after being there for twenty seven years. He was the last of the ten convicted at his trial to be released. As soon as he was released, he immersed himslef back into politics by doing official talks, and speeches, and holding meetings with different people, in order to stop the white minortiy rule in South Africa.


In 1991, Mandela was elected the president of the African National Congress to replace his friend Oliver Timbo, who was falling ill. In 1993, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize alongside then president F.W. de Klerk. During those three years and a little after Mandela was working to get democratic elections for South Africa, and that finally happened on April 27, 1994, when he voted for the first time.


After the elections, on May 9, 1994, Mandela was elected by parlaiment as the first president of a democratic South Africa. On May 10, 1994, he was inaugurated as the President of the Republic of South Africa. That same year he launched his autobiography Long Walk to Freedom. In 1995, he established the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund. The next year he was divorced with his wife Winnie. In 1998, he remarried, to a women named Graça Machel. In 1999, he stepped down after one term as president.


He continued to work with the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund and he also set up the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Mandela Rhodes Foundation. In 2001, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. But, he still continued his work with the charities and foundations until 2004, when he announced his retirement from public life. In 2008, he asked all future generations to fight for social justice.


From then on, he did not do much, due to his old age, however he did attend a ceremony for his grandson when he was made chief of the Mvezo Traditional Council. He also attended current South African President Zuma's inauguration in 2009. He released two more books, Conversations with Myself, and Nelson Mandela By Himself: The Authorised Book of Quotations between 2010 and 2011. His health began failing in 2011, with numerous trips to the hospital, until on December 5, 2013, he passed away in his home in Johannesburg.


Nelson Mandela never faltered in his dedication to democracy, equality and learning. Despite terrible provocation, he never answered racism with racism. His life is an inspiration to all who are oppressed and deprived; and to all who are opposed to oppression and deprivation.