Dr. Hendrik Verwoerd

Hendrik Fredresch Verwoerd, psychologist, sociologist, journalist, statesman and the architect of apartheid, was born in Amsterdam on 8 September 1901. He was, as he bluntly admitted in 1947, 'an extreme Afrikaner'. In 1936, he joined a deputation of six professors in protesting against the admission to South Africa of Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. From that year on, Dr Verwoerd was destined to be surrounded by controversy. Two assasination attempts were made on Verwoerd's life during his time in parliament, the second attempt proving to be succesful when in 1966 he was stabbed to death by a delivery boy, Dimitri Tsafendasi.