The requirement applies to Mandela and other members of South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC), the once-banned anti-apartheid organisation.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has termed the situation “embarrassing,” and some members of the Congress have vowed to fix it, the USA Today reported.

In the 1970s and ‘80s, the ANC was officially designated a terrorist group by the country’s ruling white minority.
Other countries, including the US, followed suit. Because of this, Rice told a Senate committee recently, her department has to issue waivers for ANC members to travel to the USA.

“This is a country with which we now have excellent relations, South Africa, but it’s frankly a rather embarrassing matter that I still have to waive in my own counterpart, the foreign minister of South Africa, not to mention the great leader Nelson Mandela,” Rice said.

Chairman of the House International Relations Committee Howard Berman is pushing a bill that would remove current and former ANC leaders from the watch lists.