Mandela speaks from the City Hall balcony

Nelson Mandela walked out of Victor Verster Prison near Paarl in the afternoon of 11 February 1990, hand in hand with Winnie Mandela, after twenty-seven years in prison. By evening he stood on the balcony of Cape Town City Hall above a packed Grand Parade, where crowds had waited all day. It was his first public speech in almost three decades. He greeted the crowd in the name of peace, democracy and freedom for all, and told them he stood before them not as a prophet but as a humble servant of the people.