THE DIFFERENCE: Nelson Mandela was a uniter and a healer. Barack Obama is a divider and a well-poisoner.

The difference between Nelson Mandela and Barack Obama is just stunning.

Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 27 years by the white apartheid government of South Africa.

Apartheid ended. Nelson Mandela was released from prison and became leader of South Africa.

Many pundits (including me) assumed there would be a blood bath — that Nelson Mandela would use his power to exact revenge against white South Africans. I expected that he would exterminate the white minority, chase whites out of the country, confiscate their property, shut down their businesses.

I certainly assumed that would happen. Many of Mandela’s public statements had indicated he was a man of the Left. And he was. He was certainly to the Left of me and probably most Americans. He got along well with the likes of Fidel Castro. His ex-wife, Winnie Mandela, was a radical Leftist who advocated violence against whites.

But Nelson Mandela turned out to be a truly great man — possibly a saint. In an act of super-human forgiveness, he seemed to harbor no bitterness toward whites for the 27 years he spent in prison.

If he was bitter (who wouldn’t be), he never showed it. Instead, he put South Africa’s future ahead of whatever bitterness he must have harbored.

Far for chasing whites out of the country, exterminating whites, and confiscating their property and businesses, he encouraged whites and their businesses to stay in South Africa. As a result, South Africa remained the most prosperous country on the African continent.

Nelson Mandela was a uniter and a healer.

Contrast Nelson Mandela with Barack Obama — who is a divider and well-poisoner.

Whenever possible, Obama injects race into politics.