Mandela’s first wife

By JACOB NG’ETICH

Evelyn Mase a nurse was the first wife of the late former President of South Africa Nelson Mandela, to whom she was married from 1944 to 1958.

Mase, a Xhosa from the Transkei province met Mandela through family friends Walter and Albertina Sisulu, subsequently marrying him at the Native Commissioner's Court after she moved to, Soweto in Johannesburg.

Two years after they married they got a Madiba Thembekile (1946–1969) and Makgatho Mandela (1950–2005) and two daughters both named Makaziwe Mandela born in 1947.

All the children they got with Mase are dead with the both daughters dying at early ages of 9 months and the other when six years, Thembi Thembekile the first born died at 23 years and Makgatho at 55, in 2005, Mandela came out to tell the world his second child with mase had died of Aids.

It is noted that the relationship between Mase and Mandela became strained when the former South African first black president became increasingly involved in the African National Congress.

Mase converted to the Jehovah's Witness religious movement and went on to divorce Mandela in 1958 according to his book Long Walk to freedom.

Mase turned out to be a vocal critic of Mandela during the 1990s, when he was freed from prison and became President of South Africa, she went ahead to marry a businessman in Soweto in 1998 and died in 2004 at the age of 92.