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Kobie Coetsee

South African politician (1931–2000)

Summary

South African politician (1931–2000)

Field	Value
name	Hendrik Jacobus Coetsee
smallimage
office	President of the Senate
term_start	20 May 1994
term_end	4 February 1997
alongside
president	Nelson Mandela
succeeding
predecessor	New office
successor	Mosiuoa Lekota (as Chairman of the National Council of Provinces)
office1	Minister of Defence
term_start1	1 April 1993
term_end1	11 May 1994
alongside1
succeeding1
predecessor1	Gene Louw
successor1	Joe Modise
order2
office2	Minister of Justice
term_start2	7 October 1980
term_end2	31 March 1993
predecessor2	Alwyn Schlebusch
successor2	Dullah Omar
constituency2
majority2
birth_date
birth_place	Ladybrand, Orange Free State, South Africa
death_date
death_place	Bloemfontein, Free State, South Africa
citizenship	South African citizenship
party	National Party
otherparty
spouse	Helena Elizabeth Malan (1956-2000)
partner
children	5 children - 2 sons and 3 daughters
alma_mater	University of the Orange Free State

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|governor-general =

|governor-general1 =

Hendrik Jacobus Coetsee (19 April 1931 – 29 July 2000), known as Kobie Coetsee, was a South African lawyer, National Party politician and administrator as well as a negotiator during the country's transition to universal democracy.

Biography

Born on 19 April 1931 in Ladybrand, Orange Free State, Union of South Africa a small agricultural town in the province of Orange Free State (now the province of Free State), he studied law at the University of the Orange Free State and qualified as an attorney. In 1968, Coetsee won the Bloemfontein West seat in the House of Assembly, vacated by J. J. Fouche, who became State President. P. W. Botha appointed him in 1978 as Deputy Minister for Defence and National Intelligence and, in 1980, to the powerful position of Justice Minister. The portfolio of Prisons was added to his responsibilities.

On 12 October 1978, Coetsee became Deputy Minister of Defence and National Security.

After the first non-racial democratic elections in South Africa in 1994, he was elected president of the Senate (which was later renamed the National Council of Provinces), although the ANC had a comfortable majority in this chamber of parliament as well. He kept that position until 1997.

Meetings with the ANC

A series of meetings between him and the imprisoned Nelson Mandela began in 1985. In 1985, he was elected provincial leader of the Orange Free State NP. From 1990 on, he participated in the negotiations between the NP-government and the ANC. In 1993 he also took over the defence portfolio from Roelf Meyer until the elections of 1994.

A Fast Attack Craft of the South African Navy was named after him.

Kobie Coetsee married Helena Elizabeth Malan on 6 October 1956 and was a father of two sons and three daughters.

References

Mondli Makhanya: Wily lawyer who won madiba's trust. Former champion of apartheid dies with integrity intact. Sunday Times (South Africa) 30 July 2000
Hendrik Jacobus (Kobie) Coetsee | a biography – South African History Online

References

(December 2017). "Harvard National Model United Nations".
Gastrow, Shelagh. (1985). "Who's who in South African politics". Johannesburg : Ravan Press.
sahoboss. (2011-02-17). "Hendrik Jacobus (Kobie) Coetsee". South African History Online.

Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

1931-births 2000-deaths people-from-ladybrand afrikaner-people south-african-people-of-dutch-descent national-party-(south-africa)-politicians defence-ministers-of-south-africa presidents-of-the-senate-of-south-africa members-of-the-house-of-assembly-(south-africa) south-african-jurists south-african-lawyers justice-ministers-of-south-africa

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