Frederik Willem de Klerk was born in Johannesburg on March 18, 1936, to a prominent Afrikaner political family with a history of public service in South Africa. (Descended from Dutch, German, and French Huguenot settlers, Afrikaners constitute approximately 60% of South Africa's white population.) De Klerk's great-grandfather had been a senator; his father, the late Jan de Klerk, served in several Cabinet posts and as president of the Senate; and an uncle, J.G. Strijdom, was Prime Minister from 1954 to 1958.

After eleven years of practicing law in Vereeniging, Transvaal, he won the local seat in Parliament for the then-ruling National Party in 1972. In 1978, he was appointed to the South African Cabinet and was responsible for six different cabinet offices until 1989.

From 1982 to 1989, Mr. de Klerk served as leader of the National Party in the Transvaal. He also served as chairman of the Ministers' Council and later as leader of the House of Assembly. In February 1989, he was elected as his party's national leader. Seven months later, after President P.W. Botha resigned, de Klerk was unanimously elected president of South Africa.

As his country's first "television president," de Klerk developed a friendlier, more open and accessible relationship with the media than any of his predecessors. He was widely praised for his efforts to keep South Africa on the negotiation path during its transition into a nonracial democracy, and for the grace he displayed during the transition.

In 1990, de Klerk made several announcements that would fundamentally change his country and accelerate the elimination of apartheid. He announced that Nelson Mandela would be released from prison and that many organizations would be unbanned, including the African National Congress. He also introduced a set of initiatives that led directly to South Africa's first-ever universal-franchise election in April 1994.

On May 10, 1994, F.W. de Klerk was sworn into office as one of two executive deputy presidents in South Africa's new Government of National Unity under President Nelson Mandela. The inauguration was the culmination of the process of negotiation and reconciliation that ended the apartheid era and transformed South Africa into a nonracial democracy, a process in which he has played a major part. For the leading role he played in the democratization of South Africa, he was a co-recipient with Nelson Mandella of the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize. He has received many other honors and honorary degrees around the world.

In June 1999, he established The F.W. de Klerk Foundation to continue the success and stability of the new multicultural South African democracy. The Foundation will address reoccurring tensions and nurture relations between diverse South African communities by popularizing and monitoring adherence to their constitution and bill of rights of 1996. The Foundation will also encourage and support peace, democratic institutions, and communication in communities around the world that are divided along ethnic, cultural and religious lines.

During an interview with Time magazine after he was named Time's Man of the Year in 1993, de Klerk described how he would like to be remembered: "I would hope that history will recognize that I, together with all those who supported me, have shown courage, integrity, and honesty at the moment of truth in our history. That we took the right turn."

He published his autobiography, The Last Trek‹A New Beginning, releasing it in the U.S. in 1999.