LUSAKA –IN one of the big moments of 2013, members of Zambia’s first two meetings with South Africa paid glowing tribute Nelson Mandela.

Ex-midfielder Joel Bwalya, who played in the 1994 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifier 3-0 win over Bafana Bafana 20 years ago, said Mandela was a larger than life character.

Bwalya got a chance to meet him during the 1996 AFCON final in Johannesburg after scoring Zambia’s goal in a 1-0 win over Ghana in a third and fourth place playoff at FNB stadium.

“He was a great man a lot of things have been said about him and you can’t say much about this man,” Bwalya  told MTNFootball.com.

“I had a chance to meet him after the third and fourth playoff game after we played against Ghana.

“We went up there in line to get our medals and shook hands. He was a huge, huge, man!

“When he greeted you he didn’t say ‘how are you?’ but he said ‘I am pleased to meet you’. And then you think, I am supposed to say that to him not the other way round. And he did that like he even knew you.”

Bwalya said just four days earlier, he bought Mandela’s best selling autobiography Long Walk to Freedom and read it all the way back from Bloemfontein for the play-off and it took him just two days to finish it.

“I told (My brother) Kalusha you have got to read this book. This man has talked about amazing things in this book,” Bwalya said.

“And five days later, we met him at the final. He was a great man for what he did, showing forgiveness and hope to his people.

“I am just happy that one time in my life I had a chance to shake his great hand.”

And ex-Football Association of Zambia vice-president Emmanuel Munaile who played for Manning Rangers during the transition period in South Africa said Africa and the world has lost an icon.

“Even those who hated him ended up loving him. He spent 27 years in jail and the first thing he did when he came out was to preach peace and reconciliation,” Munaile told MTNFootball.com.

“With a man like him, you cannot find words to describe him. Africa and the World has lost a great man in him.”

Former midfielder Linos Makwaza who scored a goal in the 3-0 win over Bafana said it was like losing a member of his own family.

Makwaza was also a member of Power Dynamos’ 1991 team that won the defunct CAF Winners Cup that was renamed the Mandela Cup.

“He was great and I will remember him like a grandfather and winning the Mandela Cup that was named after him always has greater meaning to me.” – MTNFootball