Doctors treating Nelson Mandela say the former South African President is in a “permanent vegetative state” and they have advised his family to turn off his life support machine.

This revelation, in the court documents related to a family dispute over reburying the remains of Mandela's three children.  Nelson Mandela’s grandson and heir Mandla had exhumed three of the civil rights leader’s children who had pre-deceased him, and reburied them in a plot of land he is developing with a hotel complex. 

The court has since ordered Mandla to return the bodies to the family plot where Nelson Mandela wanted to be interred. Mandla’s rival family members and community elders attended the reburial ceremony on the Mandela property.

Mandla has hit back, accusing his relatives of being vengeful and trying to wrest control of anti-apartheid figure’s legacy.

94-year old Nelson Mandela has been hospitalized since early last month with a lung infection and was said to be in critical condition. 

Despite the news over Mandela’s true condition, South African President Jacob Zuma insists, “Madiba is receiving the best medical care from a multi-disciplinary team of health professionals who are at his bedside around the clock,” he said, referring to Mandela by the clan name.