Jan de klerk

Frederik Willem de Klerk was born in Johannesburg, Transvaal (now Gauteng) on 18 March F.W. de Klerk grew up in a political family, with both his father and grandfather serving high office.

Biography of f w de klerk apartheid pdf Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball Publishers. January 9, On May 7, , de Klerk and a government delegation had their first formal meeting with Mandela and representatives of the ANC, whom the government had once considered terrorists. But black protest revived in the s and there were strikes by black workers, the uprising of school children in , and intensified attacks by the African National Congress ANC.

His father, Jan de Klerk, was a Cabinet Minister and the President of the South African Senate. His brother is Dr Willem (Wimpie) de Klerk, a political analyst and one of the founders of the Democratic Party.

After finishing school in Krugersdorp, F.W. de Klerk graduated in from Potchefstroom University with BA and Ll.B degrees (the latter cum laude).

At the same time he was awarded the Abe Bailey scholarship (an all-expenses paid educational tour to the United Kingdom). In he married Marike Willemse, with whom he had two sons and a daughter.

From de Klerk practiced as an attorney in Vereeniging.

Biography of f w de klerk apartheid in africa De Klerk attended Potschefstroom University, a center of Afrikaner nationalist thought. In May , after the NP objected to the new constitution , de Klerk withdrew it from the coalition government; the party disbanded the following year and reformed as the New National Party. In December , de Klerk joined more than thirty other Nobel Prize winners in Oslo, Norway to celebrate the prize's one-hundredth anniversary and to discuss peace in the twenty-first century. Ideologically a social conservative and an economic liberal , he led the National Party NP from to

During this time, he played an active part in Nationalist Party politics and in local educational affairs. He was offered the chair of Administrative Law at Potchefstroom University, but declined the position when he was elected Member of Parliament for Vereeniging in November

In he became information officer of the Transvaal National Party.

He held several ministerial positions in the Cabinet of President P.W. Botha, including Minister of Post and Telecommunications and Sport and Recreation (); Mines, Energy and Environmental Planning (); Mineral and Energy Affairs (); Internal Affairs (); and National Education and Planning (). In he became the Transvaal leader of the National Party after Dr Andries Treurnicht quit the party.

In he was appointed chairman of the Ministers’ Council in the House of Assembly and in he became the House’s leader. When P.W. Botha resigned as leader of the National Party in February , he was succeeded by de Klerk. In September he was elected the new State President.

F&w de klerk biography The Washington Post. Cite this article Pick a style below, and copy the text for your bibliography. Marion Crawford Memorial Society. It was as if I had a conversion.

He soon announced his policy of reform: he hoped to create a suitable climate for negotiations which would end apartheid and bring about a new Constitutional dispensation for South Africa, based on the principle of one person, one vote.

In December , de Klerk met with the imprisoned leader of the African National Congress (ANC), Nelson Mandela.

On 2 February , de Klerk lifted the ban on the ANC, the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC). On 11 February Mandela was released. Negotiations with Mandela and other party leaders were held for the peaceful end of apartheid and transition to democratic rule.

Biography of f w de klerk apartheid F layer. Archived from the original on 4 July The Political Mythology of Apartheid. In , he became chairman of the Minister's Council in the House of Assembly.

In , De Klerk and Mandela were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts at reform in South Africa.

After the elections, de Klerk was appointed the Second Vice President in President Mandela’s cabinet. In , he, together with other National Party members, withdrew from their cabinet posts in order to establish the National Party as an effective opposition to the ANC.

In Frederik Willem de Klerk retired from politics.

He testified at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) on behalf of the National Party in August and May , where his apology for apartheid was criticised as insufficient. In , he defended aspects of apartheid during an interview with CNN television and in he refused to concede that the system was a crime against humanity.

Former President Frederik Willem de Klerk passed away on 11 November in Fresnaye, Cape Town, Western Cape.