100,000 gather to see Mandela, many turned away


December 13, 2013 at 2:00p.m.

100,000 gather to see Mandela, many turned away

PRETORIA, South Africa (AP) — An estimated 100,000 South Africans lined up in Pretoria to view Nelson Mandela in his casket but about a third of the overwhelming crowd was sent away without being able to file past the bier. Many of the frustrated mourners fought back tears of disappointment on the third and last day of the revered leader’s lying in state. Mandela’s coffin was taken away by a military guard to 1 Military Hospital in Pretoria. The anti-apartheid icon will be flown Saturday to his rural home in Qunu, Eastern Cape where he will be buried on Sunday.