President Nelson Mandela has vowed to support United States President Bill Clinton even if everybody else deserts him, saying no other American president has identified himself more with the aspirations of blacks.
“He has my full support in everything that he [does],” said Mandela at a luncheon at the South African embassy in Washington. “In the jurisprudence of many … civilised countries a person is regarded as innocent until he’s convicted.”
Mandela, on his last visit to the US as head of state, also said it is a “grave injustice” for Western countries to judge South Africa by their own standards because his people have not had the same opportunities. “We have parents who have never seen the inside of a school, who cannot write their names,” Mandela said. “For you to judge us on the basis of what happens in America, in Canada and in Europe is a grave injustice. Judge us from the background from which we come. We came from years in prison, from the bush, from exile and from the underground.”
Mandela asked for US investments and help in rebuilding the social and economic infrastructure of South Africa.