Packages costing between R9500 and R18 500 a night are being offered to summit delegates and South African corporates. The price of this ”VIP South African safari with Nelson Mandela” includes a ”full-stage African extravaganza”, five-course dinner, game drive and ”limited cigars”.
Guests will also get to spend ”informal time” with Mandela, though there are no promises about exactly when he will be there.
They will be hosted at the Shambala private reserve, owned by insurance tycoon Douw Steyn. Situated in the Waterberg, about an hour and a half’s drive from Johannesburg, Shambala is being opened to the public for the first time during the summit.
Steyn has a long association with Mandela. The former president uses Steyn’s mansions in Sandhurst and London for private and business functions. A conference centre named after Mandela at Shambala is often used by government officials; and when Steyn imported a huge elephant bull from the Kruger park to stock his reserve in 2000, he named the animal ”Madiba”.
Like former Russian president Mikhail Gorbachev, who is now head of a global conservation organisation called Green Cross International, Mandela is a favourite among the greens. He is patron of a number of green groups, and his statements in favour of conservation are often quoted.
Terry Harnwell, a booking agent for the Mandela safari, says the 120 places available for each of the 10 days Mandela will be there have been selling fast.
”They have been snapped up by ambassadors, overseas and local delegates and corporates.”
Neither Harnwell nor any of the agents at Shambala are prepared to say how the money from the VIP safaris will be spent.