Now known as KwaZulu-Natal province, the region was one of the 10 "homelands" created by the white-minority government meant to group black South Africans according to their ethnicity in the country's mostly rural areas. His party was also blamed for the pre-election violence that engulfed the country and the province of Kwa-Zulu Natal before the country's historic 1994 elections. His legacy has remained a contested one due to the role he played during South Africa's apartheid era, including heading the administrative region of Zululand, a part of the "homelands" regions that were the cornerstone of the apartheid government's policy of separate development. Mr Mandela appointed him as a minister of home affairs, a position he continued to hold in the second administration of former president Thabo Mbeki. Mr Buthelezi was part of the late Nelson Mandela's first cabinet when the latter became South Africa's first democratically-elected president in 1994. Mr Ramaphosa said: "Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi has been an outstanding leader in the political and cultural life of our nation, including the ebbs and flows of our liberation struggle, the transition which secured our freedom in 1994 and our democratic dispensation." "Prince Buthelezi, who served as the democratic South Africa's first minister of home affairs, passed away in the early hours of today, Saturday, September 9 2023, just two weeks after the celebration of his 95th birthday," Mr Ramaphosa said in a statement on Saturday.Īccording to Mr Ramaphosa, arrangements for his mourning and funeral will be announced after consultations with the Zulu royal family. He was admitted to hospital in July following a failed medical procedure to ease back pain, his family said at the time. Mr Buthelezi founded the Inkatha Freedom Party, the third largest political party in South Africa when the country transitioned from the racist apartheid system to a democratic one in 1994. Controversial South African politician and traditional minister of the Zulu ethnic group Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi has died at the age of 95, president Cyril Ramaphosa has announced.
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