An Australian newspaper has been blasted by Nelson Mandela’s eldest granddaughter after she was quoted as accusing Prince Harry and Meghan Markle of ‘profiteering’ from her family’s legacy to promote their Netflix documentary.
Ndileka Mandela made headlines earlier this month when she reportedly slammed the royal couple for being inauthentic and had ‘stolen’ her grandfather’s name for their own personal gain.
The ‘deeply upset’ socialist activist was quoted by The Daily Telegraph accusing the Sussexes of using the late South African president’s quotes in their documentary series Live To Lead which the royals say was inspired by Mandela.
His ‘mortified’ granddaughter has since hit back at the piece to angrily claim the publication had exploited her grandfather’s name to attack the royal couple.
Ms Mandela set the record straight in an opinion piece for London newspaper The Independent on Sunday to claim she was misquoted by the Sydney paper, blasting them for ‘weaponising my name’ and said her grandfather’s was used to target a woman of colour.
Ndileka Mandela (pictured) has denied claims she accused Prince Harry and Meghan Markle of ‘profiteering’ from her late grandfather’s name
Ms Mandela said she was ‘terribly disappointed’ whenever her family’s legacy is used for commercial purposes that has no benefit to her late grandfather’s vision.
She insisted she had never accused Harry and Meghan of ‘profiteering’ from her grandfather’s name and was ‘shocked’ by the claims.
‘But what’s ironic is that one of the biggest examples of this happening was not carried out by Harry and Meghan at all – but carried out by their critics, who falsely exploited my grandfather’s name to attack them,’ Ms Mandela wrote.
‘The words wrongly attributed to me, criticising them for quoting my grandfather, are not mine at all – they belong not to me, but to those who have amplified these falsehoods all over the world.
‘I am mortified to have seen how my words were twisted in such a way as to distort my genuine concerns about the commercial exploitation of my grandfather’s legacy.’
Ms Mandela was quoted by The Daily Telegraph as admiring Prince Harry for having the confidence to break away from The Firm but was ‘deeply upset’ he and Meghan were using her grandfather’s legacy.
Nelson Mandela’s eldest granddaughter says she unequivocally supports Prince Harry and Meghan’s (pictured) stand and the use of her grandfather’s name
‘I don’t believe he nor Meghan have ever properly met granddad, maybe when Harry was young at Buckingham Palace, but they are using his quotations in the documentary to draw in people and make millions without the Mandela family benefiting,’ Ms Mandela was reported as saying in the Daily Telegraph.
‘I know the Nelson Mandela Foundation has supported the initiative but people have stolen grandfather’s quotes for years and have used his legacy because they know his name sells – Harry and Meghan are no different from them.’
‘But it comes at a price, you have to then fund your own life, I’ve made peace with people using granddad’s name but it’s still deeply upsetting and tedious every time it happens.’
The article sparked a swift response from Ms Mandela who insisted she ‘honestly doesn’t find anything wrong with them using that opening thing inspirational with a quote of granddad’ – and accused the couple’s critics of ‘making a mountain out of a mole hill… for no reason’.
‘Meghan has always been an activist, and this is in her activism work which my grandfather was, he was, a social justice activist through and through,’ she told Fox News earlier this month.
Ndileka Mandela (left), pictured with sister Nandi Mandela (right) and her son Luvuyo Madasa in London last month has accused an Australian newspaper of misquoting her
‘Like I said early on, a lot of people use granddad’s quotes, and nobody has been made such a big rah-rah as they are making out of Harry and Meghan using this quotation.’
Ms Mandela has since claimed in her piece for the Independent her grandfather’s legacy was misused to attack Meghan, ‘a woman of colour who was, effectively, hounded out of the British royal family’.
‘I believe it’s because despite our real victories against apartheid, colonialism and slavery – in some ways, the mindset behind these crimes – is alive and well in some of our most powerful institutions,’ she wrote.
Ms Mandela reiterated she greatly admires the royal couple for the courage to defending those less privileged and celebrates the inspiration they from her grandfather’s legacy.
She ended the article by insisting she unequivocally supported the royal couple’s stand and the use of her grandfather’s name.
Harry and Meghan say their recent Netflix documentary was inspired by former South African president, the late Nelson Mandela. He’s pictured with his then wife Winnie following his release from Victor prison, Cape Town, in 1990
