Elita and her life with F.W. de Klerk

Elita and her life with FW de Klerk

Martie Retief Meiring

Tafelberg

Acknowledgements

Delving into the lives of others is an awkward business. Initially, for Elita and FW de Klerk, a book like this was out of the question. But after much hesitation and pondering, they agreed to a series of interviews, in spite of their demanding schedule. They even allowed access to their diaries and photograph albums and made no demands or conditions. For all this I shall never be able to thank them adequately. As a journalist, I would also like to express my appreciation for their acceptance that since their story in part played out in the public domain, it held a strong element of newsworthiness.

Numerous conversations and interviews were also held with friends and family members. I would like to thank Nadia Lanaras, Maria Geurtsos, Jonathan Hudson, Ada Papadopoulos, George Lanaras, Niki Sergaki, Marianne Louw, Una Ramsay, Jeanette Curitz, Theresa Papenfus, the late Koos Rupert, Dave Steward, George and Tharina Joubert, Nico and Ruda Retief, Nontas Andries, Fana and Wilma Malherbe, Sakkie and Hettie de Klerk, and in particular Brenda Steyn, who went to considerable trouble to collect information for me.

My special thanks go also to Marinus Wiechers, who made available Marike de Klerk’s correspondence with him. We both believe, from our personal knowledge of Marike, that these last letters provide some insight into her humour and courage.

Finally I would like to express my thanks to my patient publisher, Erika Oosthuysen, copy editor Suzette Kotzè-Myburgh, proof reader Estelle Crowson and designer Nazli Jacobs.

Martie Retief Meiring

January 2008

Prologue

On 29 January 1998, the news flashed around the world: the former president of South Africa was going to leave his wife – for the wife of a friend. Everywhere, the report was greeted with shock and mystification. How was it possible that two people from such different worlds could meet – or have anything in common?

The lives of FW de Klerk and Elita Georgiadis could not have been more divergent. He was the former president of South Africa, she the Greek-born wife of a multi-millionaire. His world was politics, hers the international playgrounds of high society.

The nature of their relationship and its beginnings were as widely debated as its unacceptability. There was endless speculation, in society as well as in the media. And not only in South Africa. In Europe, the United States and especially in Greece, everyone who knew Elita, or knew about her, asked the same question. How could she, so well regarded in international circles and known to be a compassionate and fair-minded person, fall in love with a man who had for so many years been a proponent of the abhorred policy of apartheid?

It was inexplicable. Who is she? asked South Africans, who knew nothing of this woman in the life of one of their best-known political leaders. Who is he? asked Greek communities and British friends, who were aware that he had been president of an African state and a player in world events but knew nothing of him as a person.

Their secret relationship became public against the backdrop of a political upheaval that had gripped attention worldwide. This was a love affair between a president, a Nobel prize-winner who had won world fame through the dramatic changes that he had brought about in his country, and a woman without any involvement whatsoever in the political issues that had occupied his life. As the wife of a committed businessman, her life was one of wealth and privilege; she travelled all over the world, was one of a close family and chatelaine of a number of luxurious houses.

This was no simple or straightforward love. They were both still married to other people. For years they both tried to avoid divorce. Repeatedly they said to each other: It cannot happen. We must set our feelings aside. They would experience the anger of both enemies and friends when their relationship finally made headlines. In the process they would lose some of those friends; there would be accusations of betrayal, even that they had abandoned their religious principles.

He would eventually declare that he had had to make a choice against pretence, against a semblance of conventional propriety. I fell in love with an honourable woman of foreign nationality.

She would say: I met a wonderful person whom I grew to love with my whole heart.

They met for the first time at a theatre. Later, society, gossipmongers and the media would refer to their affair as a Greek drama – a drama which would play out before the avid scrutiny of both local and international media.

He was accustomed to the public gaze, she shied away from it. Immediately after the news of their affair became public, when she flew from South Africa to Greece, a reporter from the Sunday Times booked a seat on the same flight. For the first time in her life she was interviewed by a newspaper.

Her brother in law, Totis Vernicos, teased her about it: You, Elita, interviewed by the press! The shock of speaking to the media was as great as the photographs and reports in the Greek newspapers. Is that woman really me? she asked herself, appalled.

She had by then known FW for ten years. She could never have dreamed that her life would become so involved with South Africa, a country which she hardly knew and understood even less.

One: A wisdom beyond her years

In May 1989, Tony and Elita Georgiadis booked six seats for the musical Les Misérables at the Queen’s Theatre in London. Their guests for the evening would be Tony’s brother Alex, his wife Annie and two South Africans, FW and Marike de Klerk. After the performance they were to dine at the exclusive Marks Club so that the Georgiadises could make better acquaintance with the De Klerks.

Tony Georgiadis had substantial business interests in Africa, particularly in South Africa. He was well known in shipping circles and his business empire also extended to other continents. Although he and Elita had visited South Africa regularly since 1980 they had not yet had the opportunity – or the necessity – of meeting FW de Klerk.

Dr. Dawie de Villiers and his wife Suzaan were close friends of the De Klerks. During their time as ambassadorial couple in London they had also become friendly with the Georgiadis family, partly as a consequence of the Georgiadis brothers’ vested interests in South Africa. FW de Klerk had just been elected leader of the National Party and would therefore be the country’s next president. As ambassador and as a friend of both men, Dawie de Villiers thought it would be good if they could meet. He also thought that Tony, with his international business concerns, would be a good sounding board for FW.

This was FW’s first visit abroad as party leader. His chief objective was to meet with overseas heads of state and explain the radical changes planned in apartheid policy. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s invitation to Downing Street was, among other approaches, clear proof of the importance of the visit. FW was something of an unknown factor outside South Africa, and there was also curiosity about him in the business and political circles in which the Georgiadis brothers moved.

On the evening of their meeting, FW was engaged in interviews with various British politicians, so it was arranged that Tony and Elita would meet Marike de Klerk at the hotel and proceed to the theatre, where FW would join them later.

Elita sensed a tension in her South African guest and, in an attempt to put her at her ease, observed light-heartedly: It’s so true that it’s the woman behind the man that counts.

To her surprise, Marike seemed disconcerted by her remark: But what do you know about me? she asked suspiciously.

Elita realised that she had been misinterpreted and that she must treat the older woman with more circumspection. It’s just what they always say, she replied, trying to defuse the situation. After the first interval FW joined the party in the theatre and took up his seat between Elita and Marike. He immediately took Marike’s hand in his, a gesture Elita noted with approval. This is a good man, she thought.

Marike clearly enjoyed the show, but when they went on to dine at Marks Club, she still seemed nervous. Elita was struck by the degree of attention FW (which she pronounces Efwia) paid his wife during the meal. She also noticed how relaxed he appeared, both in his style of dress and in his manner. His suit and tie were less formal and he was also warmer and more approachable than the European businessmen that she knew. He seemed without conceit or a desire to impress. Almost naïve, in an appealing way and very genuine, was how she summed him up.

His eyes, of an almost unnaturally deep blue, also struck her, as did his schoolboyish charm. He chatted easily with her and he really showed an interest in what I thought, she recalled afterwards.

He in turn remembers his first meeting with her: I was surprised and charmed by this young, intelligent woman who possessed a wisdom beyond her years. (Elita, who was thirty-seven at the time of their meeting, is sixteen years younger than FW.)

The Georgiadis brothers were extremely interested in FW’s political vision and asked him penetrating questions. His replies made it clear to Elita that this was a man determined to bring about radical changes in his country. She saw him as someone who was embarking on a difficult and risky crusade and instinctively felt that she wanted to help him.

Pinned to her underwear, she always wore a porcelain button, known as an evil eye, a traditional Middle East talisman against misfortune and evil. Going quickly to the ladies’ cloakroom, she unpinned the button, clenched it in the palm of her hand and gave it to a somewhat surprised and embarrassed FW.

He had no idea of its significance. Elita laughingly explained that it was a good luck charm. It’s an eye that will help to ward off bad luck and bring you good luck – or so we Greeks believe. Later she would often wonder why she had been so impulsive in giving a strange man such a personal object.

From FW’s reaction she judged him to be a conservative man, but her gesture seemed to have given Marike pleasure. Elita noted again how comfortable Marike and FW seemed together and how heartily Marike joined in the laughter at his awkwardness over the unexpected gift.

FW later lost the button, but he was to become thoroughly acquainted with Elita’s superstitions. In years to come, he himself would never travel without similar talismans in his briefcase – an ocean pebble set in a gold heart, a silver cross and a miniature folder with her photo — although he professed to attach no superstitions to any of these.

This little incident brought some jollity to the table, but Marike soon became tense again. Did she not like them? Elita wondered. Or was she too anxious about FW’s mission in London?

So tangible was Marike’s reserve that late that night on the way home the Georgiadises said to each other: Charming man, complicated wife.

Shortly afterwards, the two couples met once again, in London, and very soon became firm friends. Tony was keenly aware that FW was travelling around the world in order to broaden his contacts and, mindful of his business interests in South Africa, he invited the De Klerks to various functions. FW and Marike were also assured of a warm welcome in the Georgiadis house in London.

What was initially regarded simply as a contact, gradually developed into a friendship. Although FW was firmly resolved to have no involvement in Georgiadis business ventures, the two men enjoyed long discussions over a wide range of topics. As an industrialist and international investor, Tony could test his views against FW’s legal and political insights. They also shared a weakness for tobacco and would smoke and talk far into the night.

On the Georgiadises’ first visit to South Africa after the London meetings, FW and Marike were their hosts in Cape Town. Both couples found that they had many South African friends in common. They began to meet regularly, in England and in South Africa.

Gradually they also began to do those things that good friends do; calling each other late at night, having one another’s children to stay, shopping together, eating out together, discussing art acquisitions, spending holidays together. They would make an effort to make time and space for one another and over the next three years they would get to know one another extremely well.

FW would learn about Elita’s privileged childhood in Greece; he would also learn of the loneliness of a sensitive child who could even at times have been called a poor little rich girl.

Two: A daughter of Kolonaki

Elizabeth Lanaras was born on 11 March 1952 in Kolonaki, an affluent suburb of Athens. Her parents, George and Helen (known as Nitsa), belonged to the younger generation of Greeks who were rebuilding their lives after the Second World War.

Elita, their first child, was a plump, healthy baby, enthusiastically welcomed by her grandmothers, grandfather and a collection of aunts, uncles and cousins, all of whom were present at all the rites attendant on the birth of a Greek infant. Old-fashioned snapshots show the baby in her bath, in her cot, at her christening, her first steps, her first baby party, sitting on granny’s lap, stiffly held by grandpa, a round-tummied toddler hand in hand with her father on the beach.

None of these photos give any hint of the desperate, turbulent world beyond this close-knit circle who met so often and posed so cheerfully for the camera. These smiling images of family and friends, arm in arm around birthday cakes and daintily laid tables, tell a great deal about the indestructibility of the Greek spirit. Around Kolonaki, Athens was still largely a city in ruins. The devastation of a world war, followed by a civil war, had transformed Beautiful Greece into a wasteland of poverty and famine.

After the initial success the Greek forces had enjoyed in October 1940 against Mussolini’s Italian invasion, Hitler sent his own troops and the German SS, with tanks and Stuka bombers, into Greece in 1941. The whole country was occupied until 1944, when the Nazis were finally routed.

In spite of their position of privilege, young Greeks such as George and Nitsa also suffered under the deprivation and terror which gripped the country during the German occupation. Even before the war, divisions in Greece ran deep; but in resisting first the Italians and then the Germans, these differences were put aside. There was a temporary collaboration between the militant, pro-Communist National Liberation Front and the pro-government forces of the Greek Democratic League that supported the monarchy.

Immediately after the German withdrawal, this coalition collapsed when the pro-Communist forces attempted to take over the government. A bitter civil war ensued, bringing another four years of suffering to the country. At least one eighth of the Greek population was wiped out during the two wars. Greek morale was further undermined by the so-called pedomasoma, during which about 28 000 children were kidnapped by pro-Communist guerrillas and taken to neighbouring Communist countries. There they were adopted and completely indoctrinated into communism; only a few would ever be reconciled with their parents.

George Lanaras had only just