Frederik Willem de Klerk, DMS; born 18 March 1936) is a South African politician who served as the country's State President from August 1989 to May 1994. He was the seventh and last head of state of South Africa under the apartheid era. De Klerk was also leader of the National Party (which later became the New National Party) from February 1989 to September 1997.

De Klerk helped to broker the end of apartheid, South Africa's policies of racial segregation and discrimination, and supported the transformation of South Africa into a non-racial democracy by entering into the negotiations that resulted in all citizens having equal voting and other rights. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 along with Nelson Mandela for his role in the ending of apartheid.

After the first universal elections in 1994, de Klerk became deputy president in the government of national unity under Nelson Mandela, a post he kept until 1996. In 1997 he resigned the leadership of the National Party and retired from politics.

In 2015, de Klerk wrote to The Times newspaper in the UK criticizing moves to remove a statue to Cecil Rhodes at Oriel College, Oxford. He was subsequently criticized by some activists who described it as 'ironic' that the last apartheid President should be defending a statue of a man labelled by critics as the "architect of apartheid". There have also been calls for him to be stripped of his Nobel Peace Prize.

More Info: en.m.wikipedia.org