ROBBEN ISLAND, South Africa -- In a somber counterpoint to his country's festive millennium celebrations, Nelson Mandela lighted a "freedom flame" Friday in his former prison cell and declared that no oppressor could ever extinguish mankind's quest for liberty.

Accompanied by six other former political prisoners, the apartheid-era hero walked down a corridor in the prison on windswept Robben Island as drummers in each cell tapped out a cadence on floors, walls and prison bars.

Mandela walked into the tiny cell where he spent 17 of his 27 years in captivity, lit a fat white candle and passed it to his successor as president, Thabo Mbeki.

"It symbolizes that the freedom flame can never be put down by anybody," Mandela said. "There are good men and women around that will always keep it alight."

Two hours before midnight, Mandela, Mbeki and a few others broke off from a gala event on Robben Island, off Cape Town, for the prison ceremony. Some 500 guests who attended a banquet on the island watched the prison ceremony on a huge screen.

"I have been fortunate to have lived through most of the century," the 81-year-old Mandela said in taped message broadcast on state television.

"It brought such great hope," he said. "In some ways we outstripped the achievements of our ancestors of all the previous centuries. In other ways, we fell short of what was hoped for and what was possible."

Mbeki, in a nationally broadcast address, evoked the pride he said Africans feel for ending colonialism and white minority rule this century. But he ticked off the continent's continuing woes: coups, wars, massacres, refugee populations, the AIDS epidemic, corruption.

"As we enter the new century and millennium, we must, as Africans, say, `Enough is enough!' We ourselves must do everything we can to strengthen democracy and entrench a culture of human rights in our own country," Mbeki said.

On the mainland, a giant laser clock beamed onto Cape Town's landmark Table Mountain counted off the seconds until midnight. On the waterfront, 100,000 revelers drank and listened to live music.

The city's security forces had been placed on high alert, with the memory of a spate of unsolved bomb attacks fresh in their minds. The last was on Christmas Eve, and injured seven police officers. No bombings were immediately reported on New Year's Eve.

In the capital, Pretoria, a concert and party on the lawns of the government Union Buildings fizzled early in the evening, when only several hundred people showed up instead of the 15,000 expected by organizers.

The Indian Ocean port of Durban also held a party, with thousands of revelers converging on the harbor area.