Nelson Mandela

Bio:
Nelson Mandela (born Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela on July 18, 1918) was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964, Nelson came to symbolize black political aspirations and was named head of the ANC after his release on Feb. 11, 1990. He and F. W. de Klerk shared the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating South Africa’s peaceful transition to multiracial democracy. After the ANC victory in the April 1994 elections, Mandela worked to ease racial tensions, court foreign investment, and provide services to the victims of apartheid. On Dec. 5, 2013, after a long battle with a lung infection, Mandela died at the age of 95.

Best Known For:
Nelson Mandela is best known for serving as the President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, the first to be elected in a fully representative, multiracial election.

Personal Life:
Nelson Mandela has been married three times, has fathered six children, has twenty grandchildren, and a growing number of great-grandchildren. He’s currently married to Graça Machel whom he married in 1998.