Thousands queue for hours to view Nelson Mandela's body - PHOTO

His head just visible as he lies in an open coffin, this is the final glimpse of Nelson Mandela that thousands of South Africans have queued for hours to see.The former president and anti-apartheid hero was today given back to the people who queued from the early hours to file past his open casket on a day of viewing reserved for the public.Aerial images showed lines of mourners snaking for around two miles as they queued patiently for buses to the building where his body is lying in state and then again as they waited to go inside.Until now the cameras of the world have often been trained on leaders, VIPs and celebrities paying tribute to a man known for his common touch - a man who related to princes and paupers with equal ease.Ordinary mourners from all walks of life had also queued for hours on end yesterday to view the body, but many were turned away by evening without having made it to the front of the long, winding line of people united in grief and gratitude for the father of their democratic nation.Many returned today for another chance, with the entire day given over to general public access.'My heart is so broken,' said Anita Bodiba, 35, who arrived at the seat of government, the Union Buildings, hours before dawn to join the long queue that had already formed.'I can't even sleep, I'm thinking of Madiba. He is the one who united us here in South Africa - white people, black people, Indian people,' she said - using the clan name by which the democracy icon is fondly known.'Today Mr Mandela's former wife Winnie told how she felt blessed to have been present when the great statesman drew his final breath.She told ITV news: 'I went close to him and I noticed he was breathing very slowly ... I was trying to feel the temperature [of his skin] and he felt cold. Then he drew his last breath and just rested ... He was gone'.Mrs Mandela said her family would remember her former husband for his legacy and reconciliation and for being so completely unselfish in giving his whole life 'to the nation and to the world'.She added: 'That is how we will remember him, that he never, at any stage thought of himself. He gave up everything for the nation'.Thousands lined the route as a black hearse, flanked by motorcycle outriders, carried the flag-draped coffin on its journey through the streets of Pretoria.In the Union Buildings amphitheatre, soon to be renamed after him, Mandela's body lies underneath a perspex screen, dressed in the type of printed shirt that became his trademark.Two navy officers stood by the coffin, their eyes downcast, and Mandela's grandson Mandla sat in a chair on the platform supporting the coffin.Some visitors collapsed as they passed the coffin, felled by the weight of their grief, and were helped away by medical personnel and fellow mourners.'It was so sad,' Alinah Lekalakala, 52, said after seeing the body of her icon.'I needed to pay my last respects because I am so grateful for what he has done. This will help me to accept that he is gone.'For Tryphina Kau, 78, the event was a joyful one.'I am very, very happy because his spirit is still with us, only the body is going,' she said, recounting the day that Mandela shook her hand while she queued to vote in South Africa's first democratic elections in 1994.'I saw him at the beginning, and I came to see him at the end.'Lebogang Phillips, a 36-year-old police officer who had served on Mandela's security detail when he was president, remembered the man as 'the friendliest person I have ever met'.'When meeting people, he would always try to speak their language, whatever it was.'The line of people queueing to catch a glimpse of their hero was already several city blocks shortly after dawn, and continued snaking around streets surrounding the Union Buildings by lunchtime.Some mourners were dressed in the vibrant yellow, green and black of the ruling African National Congress that Mandela once led, and many wore black armbands.People carried posters bearing Mandela's likeness and many clutched miniature South African flags, dancing and singing revolutionary songs from the liberation struggle era as helicopters hovered overhead.White South African siblings Sean and Louise Bos, 21 and 19 respectively, flew from Cape Town on Wednesday morning to be part of the historic occasion.They queued until closing time without making it to the front, then returned at 5.30am today, queueing about five hours to see him.'We never met him so we thought we'd come to say goodbye,' said Sean, as the pair rushed to catch a plane home afterwards.(dailymail.co.uk)ANN.Az