“What I wish to recall about him is his great intellectual honesty. He gave due credit to De Klerk for overcoming apartheid, laying the foundations, as he acknowledged his adversary, for what went on to become the approach of his entire presidency: reconciliation. This remains a very useful lesson even nowadays, and in many countries”. Speaking with journalists in the margins of a conference, Minister Emma Bonino remembered Nelson Mandela.
A personal recollection
The minister also remembered having met Mandela in a bilateral meeting in South Africa where she attended his first speech to the South African parliament when she was a European commissioner.