Johannesburg - Zindzi Mandela, the daughter of anti-apartheid icons Nelson Mandela and Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, has died aged 59, her family confirmed to Independent Media on Monday.
Mandela, who was South Africa's ambassador to Denmark, passed away in Johannesburg in the early hours of Monday after a short illness.
Mandela, who was a political and social activist in her own right, was raised by her mother after Nelson Mandela was arrested during her infancy and jailed for 27 years on treason charges for his role in fighting the racist apartheid regime. He became South Africa's first black president after the first democratic elections in 1994.
Zindzi Mandela's childhood and education were constantly disrupted by her political activist mother's frequent troubles with the apartheid government, and she was not able to finish school until she was sent to Swaziland.
She eventually was able to study at the University of Cape Town, earning a bachelor of law degree in 1985.
That same year, a young Zindzi Mandela famously read - at public meeting - her jailed father's reasons for refusing the offer of a conditional release from prison proffered by then President PW Botha.
She was the younger of Nelson Mandela's two daughters with his second wife Winnie, whom he divorced in 1996, two years into his presidency. All in all, Nelson Mandela had six children, including four with his first wife Evelyn.
Zindzi Mandela's death on Monday coincided with that of her older half brother Thembekile, who died in a car accident on July 13, 1969.