South Africa needed to make poverty eradication a top priority, says President Jacob Zuma in his birthday wish to anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela.
"From the moment Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela strode out of prison on the 11th of February 1990, we knew that South Africa would be a different place," the president said in a statement.
"He showed us that despite the divisive racial oppression and hardships that this nation had gone through, it is not only possible, but necessary to embrace one another and to reconcile the South African people."
Zuma said Mandela had laid the foundation for a "solid constitutional democracy".
"We have achieved a lot, but we must still work further to eradicate poverty and improve especially the lives of children, because Madiba loves them so much.
"Most importantly, we must spread love, ubuntu, humility and selflessness around us," said Zuma.
"To celebrate Madiba's life, let each one of us, pledge to make South Africa an even better place in every possible way."
Mandela, who was South Africa's first democratically elected president, turns 93 on Monday.
He would be celebrating the day in his Eastern Cape home town of Qunu, away from the public eye, and under constant supervision by his doctors after a respiratory infection landed him in hospital in January.
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