CAPE TOWN - While messages of condolences streamed in for former apartheid president FW de Klerk, Lukhanyo Calata, son of Cradock Four martyr Fort Calata, said that the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) should take heed of their warning that “time is against us” in bringing Apartheid criminals to book.
De Klerk died at his home in Fresnaye on Thursday aged 85, following a battle against mesothelioma cancer.
A deeply polarizing figure both in power and death, he left the country divided, and the role he played while he presided over a system that committed atrocities against black South Africans when he was in power between 1989 and 1994 was highlighted, along with a focus he served in the apartheid state security council where the decision of who to be assassinated and targeted was taken.
De Klerk was fingered in atrocities by the likes of “prime evil”, Colonel Eugene De Kock of the Vlakplaas hit squad.
De Klerk’s fingerprints were all over the country, from the black on black violence between IFP and UDF-ANC supporters in KwaZulu-Natal, KwaMakhutha massacres, 1993 killing of the Mpendulo twins and the Transkei morning raid of October 1993 that left Samora and Sadat Mpendulo, Sandiso Yose, Mzwandile Mfeya and Thanda Mtembu dead.
De Klerk’s death comes just days after the families of Calata, Matthew Goniwe, Sicelo Mhlauli, and Sparrow Mkhonto - the Cradock Four - came a step closer to finding justice as the decision on whether to prosecute those behind the murders is expected next month.
Calata said with the passing of De Klerk, they would still pursue the legal action against the other 15 suspects which had been listed.
“Personally, for me and my family, this is another apartheid criminal that has died without being held accountable for his crimes. This is due to the ANC and its successors failing to act sooner. If it was done sooner, De Klerk and others would have been held accountable and prosecuted for their crimes.
“We now have to listen to the white community hail him as a saint. But we know the truth about De Klerk and we will make sure his legacy is remembered for just that. That he be remembered as a murderer,” said Calata.
“The matter should remain the same with the Cradock Four. This is just another opportunity to call on the NPA to act expeditiously as we have been telling them time is against us with these people dying without being prosecuted.”
In a pre-recorded final message to South Africans, De Klerk said the country faces “so many challenges of a serious nature” while also describing apartheid as a “separate development”.
“I am still often accused by critics that I in some way continue to justify apartheid or separate development, as we later preferred to call it. It is true, in my younger years, that I defended separate development. I never liked the word apartheid. I did so when I was a member of parliament and I did so when I became a member of Cabinet.
“Afterwards, I apologised for the pain and indignity that apartheid has brought to persons of colour in South Africa. Many believed me but others didn’t. Let me repeat in this last message: I, without qualification, apologise for the pain and the hurt and the indignity and the damage that apartheid has done to black, brown and Indians. Since the 1980s, my views changed and in my heart of hearts realised that apartheid was wrong,” De Klerk said.
Leader of the PAC, Mzwanele Nyhontso said they sympathised with De Klerk’s victims.
“Our hearts are with the victims of De Klerk and the families he killed...but in particular the five kids he killed in 1993 and confessed about that.
“I personally opened the case last year against De Klerk so we don’t care about De Klerk. We wish that his remains be thrown in the sea but of course not in the African waters and I hope this ANC government won’t give him a state funeral after killing so many Africans,” said Nyhontso.
The Nelson Mandela Foundation said they were “saddened” to hear of De Klerk’s passing and shared their condolences with the family.
President Cyril Ramaphosa said De Klerk played a “vital role in the transition to democracy”.
“He took the courageous decision to unban political parties, release political prisoners and enter into negotiations with the liberation movement amid severe pressure to the contrary from many in his political constituency,” said Ramaphosa.
Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation chief executive Piyushi Kotecha conveyed the foundation’s condolences.
“It is, however, sad that Mr de Klerk missed the many chances he had to fully reconcile with all South Africans by acknowledging the full extent of the damage caused by apartheid. That damage is with us today. We are in many ways a broken society. It is as our founder, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, has said, ‘Mr de Klerk could have gone down in history as a truly great South African statesman, but he eroded his stature and became a small man, lacking magnanimity and generosity of spirit’,” she said.
De Klerk is survived by his widow Elita, his children Jan and Susan and his grandchildren.
The funeral arrangements have not been announced yet.
Cape Times