Obama calls Mandela 'the last great liberator of the 20th century' President Obama, at a memorial on Tuesday in South Africa, called the late Nelson Mandela "the last great liberator of the 20th century" who "earned his place in history through struggle and shrewdness" along with "persistence and faith. " Under a rainy sky at the start of summer in South Africa, Obama honored that nation's first black president and anti-apartheid leader, who was a source of inspiration in Obama's adult life. He likened the late leader to Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. and said Mandela "speaks to what is best inside us.
" "His struggle was your struggle," Obama said, speaking at First National Bank Stadium before an estimated crowd of tens of thousands of people, including British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President François Hollande, Oprah Winfrey and U2's Bono. "His triumph was your triumph. Your dignity and hope found expression in his life, and your freedom, your democracy is his cherished legacy.
" Obama compared Mandela to another of his heroes: Lincoln. Photo: President Obama's motorcade is en route to Andrews Air Force Base to depart for South Africa - @ShawnaNBCNews. Thom Hartmann: Nelson Mandela & The State of Race Relations w/Joe Madison p1. We will not see the likes of Mandela again: Obama. Describing himself as one of the countless millions who drew inspiration from Nelson Mandela, US President Barack Obama mourned the death today of the South African anti-apartheid icon and said that the world was unlikely to see a leader like him again. "I am one of the countless millions who drew inspiration from Nelson Mandela's life.
My very first political action -- the first thing I ever did that involved an issue or a policy or politics was a protest against apartheid," Obama told White House reporters soon after he was informed about the death of the former South African President who died aged 95. "I would study his words and his writings. The day he was released from prison it gave me a sense of what human beings can do when they're guided by their hopes and not by their fears.
Like so many around the globe, I cannot fully imagine my own life without the example that Nelson Mandela set. And so long as I live, I will do what I can to learn from him," Obama said. Obama's Mandela Eulogy Ignores Israeli Apartheid.