Stoffel van der Merwe

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Christoffel "Stoffel" Johannes van der Merwe (born February 19, 1939 in Postmasburg , Cape Province ) is a former South African politician , diplomat and political scientist . He was involved in the preparations for the abolition of apartheid .

Life

Van der Merwe's parents were the pastor Johannes Lodevicus and Christina Maria Etresia van der Merwe, née Pretorius. He lived for several years in Gobabis in what was then South West Africa and in 1945 moved with his family to Petrusberg in the South African Orange Free State . In 1959, he attended the University of Potchefstroom , the University of Pretoria , where he graduated in 1961 Law received. From 1962 to 1970 he worked as a diplomat in Italy, Great Britain and at the United Nations . From 1971 he worked as a professor of political science at the Randse Afrikaanse Universiteit .

Van der Merwe belonged to the ruling National Party (NP), which stood for the apartheid system. In 1981 he was elected to the National Assembly for the first time in the constituency of Helderkruin in Roodepoort . There he was one of the NP politicians most willing to reform. In 1986 he became Deputy Minister for Information, and in 1987 he was appointed Deputy Minister of Constitutional Planning by President Pieter Willem Botha to negotiate with various groups, including the banned African National Congress . In this capacity and after the election to the House of Assembly in 1987, van der Merwe acted as Botha's personal assistant for the persuasive work to be done to arouse the willingness of black representatives to negotiate a constitutional amendment in favor of future political participation. He was also a member of the State Security Council .

In March 1988 van der Merwe was appointed Minister of Information, broadcasting services and the film industry in the President's Administration, where he was specifically responsible for the SABC and the film industry. In this capacity he declared in June 1989 that the general principles of a future Bill of Rights would be acceptable to the government and he showed understanding for the fact that the "African community" wanted to exercise a right to vote before the introduction of the catalog of fundamental rights. This statement was made in the context of a public discussion of the report by the South African Law Commission on the reform of the then South African legal system.

In the first cabinet of Frederik Willem de Klerk , he became Minister in the Department of National Education and Training that same year , i.e. Minister for Black Education. In 1990 white right-wing extremists carried out an attack on his ministry. In March 1991 van der Merwe publicly assured that the future school system would no longer show any discriminatory characteristics. In July 1991, Parliament passed the Education and Training Act (German: " Education and Training Act "), which stipulated that the ministry had to coordinate the choice of the language of instruction with the parents of the students enrolled in the schools would have. In the same year he left the cabinet and became the first general secretary of the NP. De Klerk planned with him to rebuild the NP into a party capable of having a majority and open to all population groups. On November 9, 1992, he resigned as General Secretary and Member of Parliament for health reasons and has been a political analyst ever since.

Stoffel van der Merwe is married and has three daughters with his wife Fransie.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Interview by Padraig O'Malley with van der Merwe at nelsonmandela.org (1999) (English), accessed on January 31, 2015
  2. ↑ a b Report at sahistory.org.za (English), accessed on January 30, 2015
  3. ↑ David Braun: PW in move to break deadlock. The Star, June 5, 1987, p. 1.
  4. ^ SAIRR : Race Relations Survey 1987/88 . Johannesburg 1988, p. 108
  5. ↑ Biography at nelsonmandela.org (O'Malley Archives ), accessed January 31, 2015
  6. ^ SAIRR: Race Relations Survey 1987/88 . Johannesburg 1988, p. 842
  7. ^ SAIRR: Race Relations Survey 1989/90 . Johannesburg 1990. p. 146
  8. ↑ report at sahistory.org.za (English), accessed on January 31, 2015
  9. ↑ SAIRR: Race Relations Survey 1991/92 . Johannesburg 1992, pp. 186, 188
personal data
SURNAME Van der Merwe, Stoffel
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Van der Merwe, Christoffel Johannes (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION South African politician and political scientist
DATE OF BIRTH February 19, 1939
PLACE OF BIRTH Postmasburg , Cape Province