South Africa’s ex-president Frederik de Klerk has apologized for what the apartheid was not a crime against humanity. With this de Klerk officially withdrew a corresponding statement from the beginning of February. The Nobel Peace Prize winner’s statements had sparked outrage across the country.
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In a communication distributed by his foundation, de Klerk apologized for the “confusion, anger, and pain” that his statements had caused. Apartheid was “completely unacceptable,” he said.
Earlier this month, the 83-year-old former head of state said the “thought that apartheid was a crime against humanity” was a “propaganda project” initiated by “the Soviets and their allies from the ANC” “to stigmatize white South Africans by relating them to real crimes against humanity”.
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The African National Congress (ANC) fought under its chair Nelson Mandela years against the apartheid system before winning the first democratic elections in South Africa in 1994. Since then, the party has been the government in Johannesburg without interruption.
Exclusion of the Klerk from the Chamber of Deputies called
De Klerk’s statements met with vigorous criticism in the South African parliament. A protest in Parliament last Thursday triggered by the Party Fighters for Economic Freedom (EFF) led to President Cyril Ramaphosa having to postpone his speech on the state of the nation.
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The EFF called it an “insult to those who died and tortured under de Klerk’s instructions that de Klerk was sitting in a democratic parliament” and called for the 83-year-old to be excluded from the House of Representatives. Other parties and organizations, including the ruling ANC and the South African Council of Churches, also condemned de Klerk’s comments.
De Klerk was South African President from 1989 to 1994, making him the country’s last head of state during the apartheid system. In 1993, together with Nelson Mandela, he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his contribution to ending apartheid.
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