Mandela is NOT dead, yet his family fights for burial rights

June 29, 2013 02:20

As Nelson Mandela fights for his life in hospital, his relatives are pitted against each other in a legal battle, reportedly over where members of the family should be buried.

Sixteen members of the Mandela family have brought an urgent application to a regional court, reportedly to force Mandela's grandson Mandla to return remains of family members to a plot in the ancestral village where Mandela has said he wants to be buried.

Mandla, a local chief in nearby Mvezo, had exhumed the remains of three of Mandela's children in Qunu in 2011 and brought them to his village, allegedly without the consent of the rest of the family.

"I have been instructed by the 16 family members including (daughters) Makaziwe and Zindzi to take action against Mandla," the family lawyer Wesley Heyes said.

Heyes refused to comment on the reason for the legal tussle, but local media said it was about a long-running feud over the remains.

"We can't say anything further due to the sensitivity of the case," said Heyes.

The court was told that a sheriff delivered the paper to Mandla's homestead and found the gates locked. The papers were nailed to the gate after several unsuccessful attempts to hand them over.

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