South Africa’s last white president FW de Klerk dies at 85 after battling cancer

South Africa’s last white president Frederik Willem (FW) de Klerk, died on Thursday morning at his home in Cape Town, the FW de Klerk Foundation said in a statement. He was 85 years old.

“FW de Klerk died peacefully at his home in Fresnaye earlier this morning following his struggle against mesothelioma cancer,” the FW de Klerk Foundation said in a statement on Thursday.

He was diagnosed in March with mesothelioma, a type of cancer that affects the tissue lining the lungs. De Klerk had announced his diagnosis on his 85th birthdayon March 18 this year.

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He is survived by his wife Elita, children Jan and Susan, and grandchildren.

“The family will, in due course, make an announcement regarding funeral arrangements,” the foundation added.

De Klerk headed South Africa’s white minority government until 1994, when Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress party swept to power.Under de Klerk's leadership, South Africa saw a rapid end of the apartheid system, notably, without any major violence.

He shared the Nobel peace prize with Mandela but his role in the transition to democracy remains highly contested more than 20 years after the end of apartheid.

Hailing from a prominent White Afrikaner family, a white ethnic group descended mainly from Dutch colonisers, in Johannesburg, his father was a leading apartheid senator who served briefly as interim president.

He studied law, before being elected to parliament as a member of the National Party that instituted apartheid.

(With inputs from agencies)