Issue date: 3/16/10 Section: News

F.W. de Klerk

Nobel Laureate and former president of South Africa,F.W. de Klerk will speak to DePauw students in May's Ubben Lecture.

The seventh Nobel Laureate to speak in the Ubben Lecture series, de Klerk is best known for his collaboration with Nelson Mandela in engineering the end of apartheid, South Africa's policy of racial segregation. Mandela, Yasser Arafat, Yizhak Rabin and de Klerk were named Time Magazine's 1993 "Men of the Year" for their efforts towards peace.

"We're always looking ahead and thinking who we would like to get to speak," said Ken Owen, DePauw's director of media relations. "[de Klerk] only had a small number of days in the states, so we're lucky."

Sophomore Jean Rebarchak is currently enrolled in the class "Ethnicity and Conflict" and said she is eagerly anticipating the speech.

"I'm really excited about this opportunity," Rebarchak said. "It's great to be able to hear someone speak when I've been learning about them all semester."

Owen said de Klerk's speech, "In Celebration: The 20 Year Anniversary of the End of Apartheid and the Challenges Ahead," should be both timely and influential.

"This celebrates a very important time in world history," he said. "This is a nice way to commemorate it."

De Klerk will be speaking in Kresge Auditorium at 7:30 p.m. Friday, May 7.

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