BRONWYN ROBERTS, Johannesburg | Wednesday 12.30pm
NELSON MANDELA commemorated South Africa’s Youth Day by laying a wreath in Soweto, just hours before officially handing power to his deputy Thabo Mbeki on Wednesday. Several hundred people from the sprawling township outside Johannesburg greeted Mandela and his wife Graca with applause, cheers and whistles at the Hector Petersen Memorial where he laid the wreath. The memorial is named after the 14-year-old boy who was killed by apartheid police during a protest march by scholars in Soweto on June 16, 1976. Mandela, wearing one of his characteristic loose-flowing silk shirts, told the crowd who had gathered to meet him that South Africa’s youngsters must commit themselves to education. “Petersen was that boy next door who strived for the most dangerous weapon. That weapon was education,” he said. Mandela, who lived in the area before he was jailed for 27 years by the apartheid government and also briefly after his release in 1990, told the gathering, “I have come back home.” Before leaving, he signed the visiting book at the memorial, writing: “Attending the Hector Petersen anniversary was a moving experience.” The shooting of Petersen sparked a three-month uprising against the former government which engulfed other townships and left 575 people dead and 2,389 wounded. –AFP