By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Former late president Nelson Mandela’s former bodyguard and retired cop, Major-General Andre Lincoln, died at the age of 63 after a long illness on Friday morning.
His death was confirmed by his family.
Lincoln’s daughter Nikki expressed profound love for her dad.
“A part of me thought you would live forever. You were always so strong and so resilient, imagining life without you was so impossible, I let myself believe in the impossible. Rest in peace, daddy.
“I don’t know how be a person without a father, I don’t know how to navigate life without your wisdom. I love you forever. You took a piece of my heart with you, but I know a piece of yours will stay here with me,” Nikki said.
Western Cape Minister of Police Oversight and Community Safety Anroux Marais described Lincoln as a dedicated public servant whose contribution to policing would leave a lasting legacy.
“Major-General Lincoln’s contribution to improving safety in the Western Cape will continue to form part of the legacy he leaves behind. My thoughts are with his family during this difficult time,” Marais said.
Lincoln’s law enforcement career began before the advent of democracy, during which he was also involved in underground intelligence work. After 1994. He was appointed by former president Thabo Mbeki to head the Presidential Investigation Task Unit.
He had previously served as one of Mandela’s bodyguards and reportedly helped prevent an assassination attempt during the 1994 presidential inauguration.
Lincoln later served as a cluster commander before taking up his final post as head of the Anti-Gang Unit, which was launched to respond to the surge in violent crime and gang activity across the Western Cape. He retired in 2021.
Lincoln was born in the city of Mahikeng in South Africa’s North West province on 28 October 1961 to devoutly Catholic parents, Reginald and Wilma.
The two met in Mahikeng and later got married there in October 1960.
They had three children, Lincoln and two daughters.
Before 1994, Reggie was involved in underground MK activities — he’d helped smuggle recruits from Mahikeng to Lobatse in Botswana.
In 1982, still following in his dad’s footsteps, Lincoln joined MK as part of a cell led by Tony Yengeni, now a former ANC chief whip, who gave him a crash course in underground warfare in an abandoned classroom in Kensington.
Lincoln received further military training in Zimbabwe and Angola, and later worked in the MK information wing.
By 1989, he worked on a campaign that involved marches and other acts of defiance by organisations that the apartheid government had banned.
Lincoln is survived by his wife, Shereen, and their children. Funeral arrangements have not yet been announced.