Graça: We didn't give Madiba bad news

Nelson Mandela was shielded in his final years from "bad news" - because events such as the Marikana massacre and constant scandals involving senior ANC leaders would have led to "suffering".

This is what the late president's widow, Graça Machel, revealed in her first interview since the six-month period of mourning ended.

Speaking to The Guardian newspaper, Machel also revealed how uneasy she had been when senior ANC leaders, including President Jacob Zuma and his deputy, Cyril Rama-phosa, visited a frail Mandela and posed for photographs.

"It was not right to expose him to that kind of a situation," said Machel.

She also told The Guardian how she tried to shield her husband from news events that would have upset him.

Speaking about the Marikana massacre, when the police killed 34 striking miners in August 2012, she said: "We were already in a period where he would be well and unwell. He did see, he was aware that it was happening, but not in its depth.

"Sometimes it would be three newspapers we'd remove, sometimes it was TV. I would screen the news ... because I just felt it was time for us to protect him and to give him peace."

She said she also tried not to let him know of other news such as violence against children.

"I didn't want him to be aware of all the things which were happening because, knowing him, he would be really aggrieved. He would suffer, but he wouldn't be able to do much."

Commenting on Mandela's final moments before he died on December 5, she said she was at his bedside alongside his second wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. Although she would not elaborate, Machel said: "It was peaceful, yes, definitely. It was peaceful and that's all I am prepared to say."

Mandela's former personal assistant, Zelda la Grange, recently revealed in her book how Machel and her family were shunned by some of the Mandela family, even cutting her out of the funeral arrangements.

She did not want to comment about these revelations, saying only that she was grateful to the Mandela family for ending the mourning period so that she could return to her activism work.