1 | Name: | Ms. Helen Suzman | |
Institution: | Helen Suzman Foundation | ||
Year Elected: | 2008 | ||
Class: | 5. The Arts, Professions, and Leaders in Public & Private Affairs | ||
Subdivision: | 503. Administrators, Bankers and Opinion Leaders from the Public or Private Sectors | ||
Residency: | International | ||
Living? : | Deceased | ||
Birth Date: | 1917 | ||
Death Date: | January 1, 2009 | ||
In thirty-six years as a member of the South African Parliament, Helen Suzman worked tirelessly to bring democracy to her native land. The sole parliamentarian unequivocally opposed to apartheid from 1961 to 1974, she stood alone, in a divided, patriarchal society, as a progressive voice for equality and human rights. Confronting difficult and unpopular issues head on, she fought for universal suffrage, visited prisons and publicly challenged pro-apartheid officials. In a famous exchange with a fellow parliamentarian who suggested that her questions embarrassed her country overseas, Suzman replied, "It is not my questions that embarrass South Africa, it is your answers." In 1996 Suzman stood with Nelson Mandela as he signed South Africa's new constitution. Since then, she has founded her own foundation to further promote the principles - liberty, equality, empowerment for the powerless - to which she devoted her political career. A two-time nominee for the Nobel Prize, Helen Suzman was voted one of the "100 Greatest South Africans" of all time in 2004. She was elected an international member of the American Philosophical Society in 2008. |