South Africa's government has ordered sculptors to remove a bronze rabbit they hid in the ear of a Nelson Mandela statue, unveiled after the former president's death last month.
It wanted to "restore dignity back to the statue", a spokesman told the BBC.
The sculptors reportedly inserted the rabbit as a trademark signature and to denote the haste with which they had to complete the statue.
Rabbit in the Afrikaans language is "haas", which also means haste.
"We don't think it's appropriate because Nelson Mandela never had a rabbit on his ear," Mogomotsi Mogodiri, the spokesman for the Department of Arts and Culture, told the BBC's Focus on Africa radio programme.
"We'd want people to see that statue as a symbol of hope, not about something like a rabbit."
The nine-metre (30ft) bronze statue was unveiled on December 16, a day after Mr Mandela was buried.
It stands at the Union Buildings, the government headquarters in the capital, Pretoria.
Mr Mogodiri said the sculptors had apologised for any offence caused to the government and Mr Mandela's family by placing the rabbit in the statue's right ear.
"Discussions are going on about when the rabbit will be removed. The government wants it removed as soon as possible to restore dignity back to the statue," he said.
The sculptors, Andre Prinsloo and Ruhan Janse van Vuuren, said they had added the rabbit to the statue after the department refused to allow them to engrave their signatures on the trousers of the statue, South Africa's Beeld newspaper reported.
