International Day For Mandela

As the ill-health of the former freedom fighter and president is monitored minute-by-minute around South Africa and the world, Nelson Mandela's 95th birthday draws near.
The day - 18th July - was recognised in 2009 by the UN as Nelson Mandela International Day.
For the 4th Mandela International Day, there're official programmes across Sth Africa to celebrate Mandela's birthday, but various organisations have worked out plans to celebrate the day with public gatherings, concerts and charity events.
Mandela gave fresh impetus to the 'charity begins at home' adage, by telling the world that all people can make a difference. Mandela Day serves as an annual call-to-action to people everywhere, to contribute to the global movement for doing good, by effecting change within their communities. People are urged to give 67 minutes of their time to make a change in their community and thus the world.

[Mandela is known as 'Madiba', the name of the Xhosa tribe to which he belongs. It's considered an act of honour to refer to somebody by the name of his tribe. He was given the English name 'Nelson' by his teacher on his first day at school. Giving African children English names was a custom in those days and was influenced by British colonials who could not easily, and often would not, pronounce African names.]
Nelson Mandela has been in a Pretoria hospital since 8th June for a recurring lung infection.