Frederik de Klerk

Frederik Willem De Klerk (born the March 18th 1936 with Johannesburg, is a South-African Politician , president of the Republic of South Africa of 1989 with 1994.

Origin and studies

F.W. De Klerk has been born in Johannesburg in 1936 in a family installed in the country for three centuries, pertaining to the Dutch reformed Church. He is the son of Jan De Klerk, principal then Minister and president of the Senate, and the nephew of JG Strijdom which was head of government of 1954 with 1958.

High-school pupil with Krugersdorp, in the suburbs of Johannesburg, it is graduate in Droit with mention of the university of Potchefstroom in 1958.

It is during its academic works that it adheres to the national Parti and becomes member of the Broederbond.

Lawyer with Vereeniging in the south of the Transvaal, it refuses in 1972 the Chaire of public Droit to the university of Potchefstroom to present itself to the general elections.

Political ascendance (1972-1989)

Appointed elected official of Vereeniging in November 1972, Frederik de Klerk enters to the government as of 1978 more to leave it. Of 1984 with 1989, it is very with turn:

Minister for the posts, telecommunications, the health insurance and the pensions
minister of sport and the leisures
Minister for the mines and the environment
Minister for the mines and energy
Minister for the business interns, the public services and state education

In parallel, in March 1982, it is elected president of the federation of the national party in Transvaal following the schism carried out by the former president, Andries Treurnicht.

July 1st 1985, he becomes the president of the Council of Ministers to the Parliament and chief of the white room of Parliament on December 1st 1986.

In 1989, Frederik De Klerk is then Minister for state education in the government of Pieter Botha. It again introduces to the station president of the National Party. Opposed to Chris Heunis, Barend of Plessis and Pik Botha, he is elected the February 2nd 1989 with the third ballot by 69 votes against 61 in Barend of Plessis. He succeeds then Pieter Botha which is still maintained with the report heading.

Supported by the party and the cabinet, it enters for several months in open crisis with president Pieter Botha, which finally, resigns of the presidency on August 14th, 1989.

The President of South Africa (1989-1994)

Frederik De Klerk takes over temporarily the duties of the presidency starting from the August 15th 1989 and organizes general elections the September 6th 1989. The National Party gains these elections over a program reformist but is seriously hung on its line by the Conservative party of Andries Treurnicht.

Known for its taste of the negotiation, “ rigidity is bad… I believe in persuasion ”, it carefully will ensure the end of the mode of the Apartheid. As of on August 28th, 1989, it goes in Zambia to discuss with the president Kenneth Kaunda, whose country sheltered the staff and several camps of ANC ( African National congress ). It meets there in secrecy the representatives of the ANC, but also of the Soviet diplomats who said to him, in substance: “ the payment of your interior matters does not concern us… one can mean ”.

After many other confidential negotiations, and the intervention of the representatives of the said African countries, “ frontline ”, it announces in February 1990, the legalization of the African National congress ( African National Congress , ANC) and the release of its historical leader, Nelson Mandela.

It also starts an international round which leads it in particular in France where it meets the president François Mitterrand, which had not received in 1987 the president Pieter Botha come to commemorate the dead South-African soldiers during the First World War in France.

Its negotiations followed with the leader of the black majority were worth joint obtaining to them, in 1993, of the Nobel Prize of peace.

In March 1992, following the attacks of the Extreme-right-hand side and with a succession of defeats at the time of bys-election, it makes ratify by Référendum the continuation of the constitutional negotiations by the white population (68% of approval).

The negotiations lead to the establishment of a provisional constitution and the first multiracial elections in April 1994, after which the new Parliament elects Nelson Mandela with the Presidency of the Republic.

The vice-president of a government of national union (1994-1996)

In 1994, following the general elections gained by the ANC, Frederik de Klerk assumes with Thabo Mbeki one of the two new posts of vice-president.

At the time of these elections, the National Party of Klerk collects 20% of the votes at the national level, the majority of the votes and the direction of the new province of the Cape-Westerner.

In 1996, De Klerk resigns of the vice-presidency and puts an end to the participation of the National Party in the governmental functions.

In retirement political life activates (since 1997)

The September 9th 1997, Frederik De Klerk leaves the direction of the national Parti ( National Party ) and withdraws political life. The old party of apartheid, renamed New Party national ( National New Party - NP), crumbles with the elections of 1999, competed with by a more pugnacious opposition party, the Democratic party.

Frederik de Klerk is during this time withdrawn in its farm close to Paarl with his new Elita wife.

In 2000, foundation FW of Klerk is rested by the former president with for objective promoting peace in the multi-Community states, whether it is in South Africa or whole world.

At the beginning of the Years 2000, Marike De Klerk, the former wife of Frederik de Klerk, is assassinated in its residence in the Cape. She becomes one of the symbols of criminality which gallops in the country.

In 2004, De Klerk takes part in the Global Leadership Foundation of which the objective is to come to assistance of the Heads of States and government in order to promote peace, the Démocratie and the development. In South-African interior policy, he denounces the scuttling of residual NP and his fusion in the ANC.

In 2005, it denounces activism revisionist and the treason of his promises by the ANC concerning the respect of the minorities. For him, the procedure aiming at débaptiser Pretoria to call it Tshwane, without preliminary consultation of the inhabitants of the city, is an abuse majority more especially as these white inhabitants, majoritairements, are hostile there.

In March 2006, at the time of its 70 years, Nelson Mandela paid to him homage to have avoided a blood bath to South Africa by accepting the negotiation and the principle of nonracial South Africa.

The April 30th 2006, De Klerk creates sensation in an article of Sunday Independant in answer to Desmond Tutu which considered it regrettable that the “ South-African white community was not grateful enough towards the South-African Blacks for generosity that those had in their connection ”. For Fréderik de Klerk, “ the black citizens should be grateful towards the White to have left them the capacity and to have thus overcome their fears ”. He repeated that the system of apartheid was morally indefensible but refused to qualify the white mode of “ criminal ”. The White them also had made sacrifices: “ would not be it as judicious for the black South-Africans to recognize the contribution as the White brought to South Africa new (...) Because that asks for courage of overcome its fears and to put its confidence in the hands of its ex-enemies ”. He particularly called upon the animated history of Afrikaners which has, in his eyes, sacrificed several centuries of revolts and searches of freedom for constuire nonracial South Africa.

In June 2006, of Klerk was operated, in a private clinic of the Cape, of two malignant cancerous metastases located in its back. Following evasive or contradictory medical bulletins, rumors on its death circulated however causing the hospitalization of his young wife.

Distinctions

South-African Decoration about the merit (1981)
Price of International Courage (1992)
Price Houphouet-Boigny (1992)
Price of the Prince of Asturies (1992)
Price of the peace given by the town of Philadelphia (1993)
Nobel Prize of peace (1993) with Gold Nelson Mandela
Place in the Order of Mapungubwe given by president Thabo Mbeki

Frederik de Klerk is also honorary president of the company praguoise for the international cooperation, member of the assembly of the Parliaments of the culture of Istambul and member of Forum 2000, a think thank rested by the Czech president Vaclav Havel and the Nobel Prize Elie Wiesel.

He is member of the council of the Peres center for peace in Israel.

He is honorary member of the Club of Rome.

Memories

The Last Trek - has New Beginning , Macmillan, January 1999

References

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