F W de Klerk
South African president and Afrikaner nationalist who won the Nobel Peace prize with Nelson Mandela for his role in ending apartheid
FW DE KLERK, who has died aged 85, was South Africa’s last white president, a dedicated Afrikaner nationalist who brought an end to apartheid and launched negotiations which he knew would lead inevitably to black rule and his own fall from political power.
When de Klerk and Nelson Mandela, the African leader he had released after 27 years in prison, shook hands as they jointly received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993, South Africans, both black and white, were still reeling from the implications of a peaceful political transition that had been inconceivable a few years earlier.
De Klerk’s own role in bringing about such a momentous change was overshadowed by Mandela’s magnanimity and willingness to reconcile all races – qualities that transformed South Africa’s first black leader into a revered international statesman.
But history will surely judge that the man who was a lifelong member of the National Party, the once all-powerful Afrikaner political group which had introduced apartheid, was also a courageous, if not visionary, leader.
Mounting international pressures and internal turmoil apart, for a South African leader to stand up and tell his white electorate that he was lifting the ban on the African National Congress and releasing all political prisoners was astounding at the time. “Apartheid is now a closed book,” he declared.
Frederik Willem de Klerk was born on March 18 1936 in Johannesburg, into a family steeped in South African politics. His ancestors, like those of many Afrikaners, were Dutch Huguenots who had fled Europe in the 17th century to escape the persecution of Cardinal Richelieu.
He was quick to remind interviewers that his family had been involved in the Afrikaners’ own “struggle for freedom” – from the British who had occupied the Cape during the Napoleonic Wars. A de Klerk had been hanged by the British for treason before they joined in the Great Trek, the retreat by ox-wagons into the interior. De Klerks had fought in the famous 19th-century battles against the Zulus and later in the Anglo-boer War at the turn of that century.
De Klerk’s grandfather, Willem, was a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church and one of the founders of the National Party (NP) in 1914. His aunt was married to JG Strijdom, an early South African prime minister.
His father, Johannes “Jan” de Klerk, became secretary of the NP in the Transvaal province when the party gained power in a whites-only election on an apartheid platform. Jan de Klerk went on to become a cabinet minister and president of the Senate.
In his autobiography, “FW”, as he became popularly known, wrote of his pride in his family’s heritage: “I was born into a family that had been closely involved in the whole historic development of the Afrikaner nation. We need to acknowledge the deep injustices of apartheid but we must also acknowledge the historical dilemma in which Afrikaners, as a separate nation with their own right to independence, found themselves.” F W de Klerk studied law at Potchefstroom University in the western Transvaal and opened what was to become a highly successful legal practice in Vereeninging.
His distinction as a legal authority led to the offer of a professorship at his old university, but he declined, knowing that his destiny lay in politics.
He was first elected to the South African Parliament in 1969 as the NP member for Vereeninging, and 10 years later was in the cabinet under the prime minister John Vorster, serving first as Minister of Posts and Telecommunications and then of Social Welfare and Pensions.
When the irascible, finger-wagging PW Botha succeeded Vorster as South African prime minister, FW de Klerk’s stature and influence in the NP became stronger. He held numerous cabinet posts, including Internal Affairs (1982-85) and National Education (1985-89), also becoming the N P leader in the powerful Transvaal province.
As he was part of a government that appeared to strengthen apartheid legislation and take even more ruthless measures to combat growing “subversive” opposition, de Klerk was at this stage identified with the verkrampte – or the extreme Right wing of the government. He had, for instance, as education minister, defended segregated universities.
His brother, Willem “Wimpie” de Klerk, a respected liberal journalist and editor who had founded the antiapartheid Democratic Party, would deny that FW was a Right-wing ideologue. “He is an intensely practical man and a very pragmatic politician,” he used to say. FW himself would often quote Otto von Bismarck’s dictum that “Politics is the art of the possible.”
With other cabinet ministers and influential people in the ruling party, de Klerk became increasingly perturbed by the way PW Botha was allowing his security advisers – generals, police chiefs and intelligence officers – to increase their political influence. Botha had, in fact, created a powerful body of security chiefs to replace his own cabinet in all key decisions, to combat the mounting turmoil in black areas throughout South Africa.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War in 1989, de Klerk acknowledged that South Africa’s formidable and ruthless military structure, which Botha had established ostensibly to combat “the Red menace”, could no longer be justified.
He positioned himself as leader of the verligte (enlightened) faction in the cabinet and as such was elected the head of the NP, becoming State President in 1989 in succession to PW Botha, who had suffered a stroke. In his first speech as party leader, de Klerk set a new course for change, calling for a non-racist South Africa and for all-embracing negotiations on the country’s future.
Botha had appeared to have flirted, very cautiously, with the idea of talking to Nelson Mandela, moving the icon of the black struggle for freedom from a prison cell to his own comfortable bungalow in the grounds of a prison farm near Paarl in the Cape winelands.
De Klerk made it clear from the start that negotiations with Mandela and the ANC were a government priority. He immediately set about clipping the wings of the “securocrats”, particularly the sinister security police units which had been responsible for numerous political assassinations and atrocities.
More significantly, he ordered that South Africa’s clandestine nuclear weapons programme be dismantled. The country had a stockpile of such weapons, a fact never acknowledged publicly until 1993, when de Klerk was able to announce that South Africa had unilaterally completed nuclear disarmament.
Diplomats, captains of industry and many others found the new president a hugely refreshing and encouraging change from the long line of granitefaced, Calvinistic leaders who had preceded him. De Klerk was approachable, affable, always prepared to listen to opposing views and a man of his word.
A heavy smoker and a keen golfer, he had charm, a self-deprecating wit and was socially at ease in any company. “He came across as one of the boys and would enjoy a drink or two along with the jokes in the club house,” said an industrialist who played golf with him. “Underneath it all, one sensed this steely resolve to do what he thought was right for his country.”
Less than a year after taking office, de Klerk held his first formal meeting with Nelson Mandela. Both declared the meeting “amicable” and affirmed their faith in their mutual integrity. The process that was to lead, after three years of tough negotiations, to the ending of apartheid, the historic release of Mandela and South Africa’s first elections under universal franchise was underway.
De Klerk’s personal relationship with Mandela was cordial enough throughout the transitional period and the Afrikaner became the deputy president in the first black government. The two men later had some acrimonious exchanges during Mandela’s presidency. In 1996 de Klerk resigned from the transitional government and withdrew to the sidelines with his NP colleagues.
Those close to him at the time said that he had become disillusioned and embittered by the perception promoted by many within the ANC and critics elsewhere that he had been forced by international pressure and internal revolution to cede power. “He believed that he alone had taken the huge decision in the best interests of South Africa’s future,” a friend said.
When it became clear that his beloved National Party was doomed to disintegration, de Klerk resigned as leader and announced his retirement from politics.
He later established the pro-peace FW de Klerk Foundation and the Global Leadership Foundation, both of which aimed to develop leadership potential among young people and promote negotiations as a way of resolving international problems.
He also suffered personal problems. In 1998 de Klerk and his wife, Marike, were divorced after the discovery of his affair with Elita Georgiades, then the wife of Tony Georgiades, a Greek shipping tycoon who had supported the NP. Elita divorced her husband and married de Klerk, a move that scandalised many Afrikaners and led to more criticism than his decision to end apartheid.
Marike, who had married de Klerk shortly after they met at Potchefstroom University, suffered from chronic depression after the break-up. In 2001, she was found stabbed and violently strangled to death in her Cape Town apartment. A 21-year-old security guard at the complex was arrested and charged with her murder. He was later sentenced to life imprisonment.
De Klerk is survived by Elita and by two sons and a daughter from his marriage to Marike.
F W de Klerk, born March 18 1936, died November 11 2021