``We would like to invite President Nelson Mandela and his wife Graca Machel to visit the Osho Commune International Meditation Resort, where people from over 100 countries live, work and meditate together,'' said Swami Satya Vedant, chancellor of Osho Multivarsity, in his invitation letter to Mandela, who has expressed his desire for a calm and peaceful retirement.

Swami Vedant believes that the Commune's meditation resort, where race, culture, background, religion and colour knows no bar, is the ideal place for a person who has sacrificed 27 years of his life to solitary confinement, in his fight against apartheid.

``He has spent his life struggling to alleviate the effects of man-made differences between individuals,'' said Swami Vedant. ``He might not be aware that at our meditation resort wework consciously to drop all the barriers by which societies have managed to divide and discriminate against men.''

Swami Vedant thinks that Mandela would be ``perfectly at home in an atmosphere'' where meditation is ``scientific and concrete, specifically designed for contemporary people like Mandela''.

``The ability to enjoy one's company is the key to meditation,'' he said, ``Through meditation future power-holders can learn self-respect and have faith in their own opinions. It will ensure that they use their powers for the good of society, not for their temporary psychological gratification.''

The Resort would be honoured to welcome a person of Mandela's stature into the Commune, where Zorba the Buddha is celebrated. ``A man whose feet are firmly on the ground, but whose hands can touch the stars,'' said Swami Vedant in a press release on Monday.