Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd
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Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd (8 September 1901 – 6 September 1966) was Prime Minister of South Africa from 1958 until his assassination in 1966. Unlike his predecessors, Verwoerd was not born in South Africa, but immigrated at age two with his parents from the Netherlands. A polarizing figure, he is widely considered the architect of apartheid, and was president during the Sharpeville Massacre, the banning of the African National Congress and Pan Africanist Congress, and the treason trial of Nelson Mandela and others. He also presided over the establishment of a republic through the use of questionable electoral practises in a whites-only referendum. However, in a controversial 2004 poll by the South African Broadcasting Corporation, asking South Africans to name the top 100 South Africans of all time, he was voted 19th.
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Youth
Verwoerd was born in Weesp, near Amsterdam in the Netherlands. His father, Wilhelm Verwoerd, a building contractor and a missionary for the Dutch Reformed Church, relocated the family to South Africa in 1903. Verwoerd obtained his doctorate in Afrikaans at Stellenbosch University. In the 1930s he made brief visits to Germany and the USA.
Architect of apartheid
Verwoerd, formerly Minister for Native Affairs, firmly believed in apartheid, and that the black population, by far the majority, had no political role to play in the Republic of South Africa. Several Bantustans, or homelands, were created under the pretext of being independent. He argued that these were the original areas of descent for the black South African population, and effectively made them citizens of different countries. In reality, these were areas not yet settled by white farmers, or where farming wasn't economically viable. Mass population transfers occurred when blacks were forcibly moved out of the cities and into these areas, during which many died. He also stripped the mixed-race Coloureds of their voting rights by amending an entrenched clause in the Union's Constitution; since his party did not have the required two-thirds majority in both Houses of Parliament which would have allowed him to do this, he enlarged the Senate with his own appointees. Once the legislation was passed, the Senate's membership was changed back to its original size.
A republic
During Verwoerd's term in office, South Africa ceased to be a Commonwealth realm under Queen Elizabeth II known as the Union of South Africa, instead becoming a republic in 1961, known as the Republic of South Africa. The creation of a republic was one of the National Party's long-term goals since originally coming to power in 1948; however the opposition United Party and many English-speaking whites of British descent were opposed to this.
Once again, Verwoerd changed the law to his advantage: He lowered the voting age for whites to 18, and allowed whites in South West Africa to vote. On 5 October 1960 a referendum was held in which white voters were asked "Do you support a republic for the Union?" — 52 percent voted 'Yes'. However, this brought into question South Africa's status within the Commmonwealth, which included many of South Africa's main trading partners, such as the United Kingdom. Since India had become a republic in 1950, republic status was no longer incompatible with membership, but the Commonwealth now had new Asian and African members who saw the apartheid regime's membership as an affront to the organization's democratic principles. Consequently, South Africa left the Commonwealth on becoming a republic, although many in the National Party welcomed this as a clean break with the colonial past.
Assassination
On 16 April 1960, Verwoerd was shot and injured by David Pratt while he, as president, was opening the Rand Easter Show at Milner Park, Johannesburg. Pratt was declared insane and sent to a mental institution in Bloemfontein, committing suicide a few months later.
In 1966, Verwoerd was stabbed to death in the House of Assembly by Dimitri Tsafendas, a parliamentary clerk, who escaped the death penalty on the grounds of insanity, saying that a large worm in his stomach told him to kill Verwoerd.
Tsafendas's motive for killing Verwoerd remains unclear. Tsafendas had a Mozambican mother and, although not racially classified as a "coloured", he had a dark skin. This may have played a role, since he had recently fallen in love with a coloured woman. He had applied for reclassification as a coloured, since sexual relations between people of different races were illegal under apartheid.
It is also unclear to what degree the murder was a political act. The trial of Tsafendas dealt mainly with the question of whether he was capable of fully understanding the consequences of his actions, and possible motives were never discussed. The attorney general alleged that Tsafendas was a "hired killer", but this was not accepted by Judge Beyers, who ordered Tsafendas to be imprisoned indefinitely at the "State President's pleasure."
See also
External links
- Account of the trial of Demitrios Tsafendas (http://www.litnet.co.za/seminarroom/mimis.asp), by Judge Wilfred Cooper who led his defence
| Preceded by: Johannes Gerhardus Strijdom | Prime Minister of South Africa 1958–1966 | Succeeded by: Balthazar Johannes Vorster Template:End boxde:Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd fr:Hendrik Verwoerd |