“I prefer to live in South Africa because it's a wonderful country; because I've been there for 300 years.”

On The Washington Journal of C-SPAN https://www.c-span.org/video/?124979-1/the-trek-beginning (11 June 1999)
1990s, 1999

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I prefer to live in South Africa because it's a wonderful country; because I've been there for 300 years." by F. W. de Klerk?
F. W. de Klerk photo
F. W. de Klerk 22
South African politician 1936

Related quotes

Jeet Thayil photo

“I was born in the south of India but I've never lived there. I went to school in Bombay, and in Hong Kong and in New York. But the place I've lived in the most is Bombay, because I've been there at various stages of my life.”

Jeet Thayil (1959) Indian writer

On his being asked Where was he born?
Jeet Thayil on why 'Where are you from?' is a complicated question for all of us

George W. Bush photo

“Zimbabwe used to feed South Africa. Today it's a net importer of food because the rule of an incompetent government destroyed the economy of the country.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2010s, 2011, Q&A with Former President George W. Bush (January 2011)
Context: Yes. I also put in the book that I felt Hugo Chavez was the Robert Mugabe of our hemisphere. In other words, this is a case for – where leadership is destroying a country. Zimbabwe used to feed South Africa. Today it's a net importer of food because the rule of an incompetent government destroyed the economy of the country.

John Muir photo

“I've had a great time in South America and South Africa. Indeed it now seems that on this pair of wild hot continents I've enjoyed the most fruitful year of my life.”

John Muir (1838–1914) Scottish-born American naturalist and author

letter to William Colby (4 February 1912); published in " John Muir — President of the Sierra Club http://archive.org/stream/sierraclubbullet1019sier#page/n17/mode/2up", by William E. Colby, Sierra Club Bulletin, volume 10, number 1 (John Muir Memorial Issue, January 1916) pages 2-7 (at page 6); and in John Muir's Last Journey, edited by Michael P. Branch (Island Press, 2001), page 160
1910s

Elon Musk photo

“I think South Africa is a great country.”

Elon Musk (1971) South African-born American entrepreneur

Source: Conversation: Elon Musk on Wired Science (2007)

Alfred Milner, 1st Viscount Milner photo

“If, ten years hence, there are three men of British race to two of Dutch, the country [i.e. South Africa] will be safe and prosperous.”

Alfred Milner, 1st Viscount Milner (1854–1925) British statesman and colonial administrator

Milner on 27 December 1900, in private correspondence with Major Hanbury-Williams, as quoted by C. Headlam in The Milner Papers: South Africa, 1933, Cassell, p. 242

Debbie Reynolds photo

“I just think my life's been really blessed, because being in show business I've met wonderful people and I've traveled all over the world…I ain't down yet, and I've had a wonderful life, and I still have more life to go.”

Debbie Reynolds (1932–2016) American actress, singer, and dancer

On being in show business (as quoted in “FLASHBACK: Debbie Reynolds Recalls Poor Upbringing and How Gene Kelly Helped Her Career in Early ET Interviews” https://www.etonline.com/news/206086_debbie_reynolds_recalls_poor_upbringing_and_how_gene_kelly_helped_her_career_early_et_interviews (ET Online; 2016 Dec 29)

P. W. Botha photo

“Unfortunately [South Africa] has been badly repaid for her loyalty because the West has expelled her from the family circle while befriending the most dictatorial regimes on Earth.”

P. W. Botha (1916–2006) South African prime minister

As state president in an interview with Figaro, Paris, 8 December 1986, as cited in The Star, and Pieter-Dirk Uys, 1987, PW Botha in his own words, p. 41

Dixy Lee Ray photo

“A nuclear-power plant is infinitely safer than eating, because 300 people choke to death on food every year.”

Dixy Lee Ray (1914–1994) Seventh governor of Washington

October 1975, quoted in a Seattle Times obituary published January 3, 1994.
Don Duncan, Mark Matassa, Jim Simon, " Dixy Lee Ray: Unpolitical, Unique, Uncompromising http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19940103&slug=1887837", January 3, 1994, Seattle Times. Accessed 28 August 2012.
Although this comment is quoted approvingly by nuclear industry supporters, it is also frequently cited mockingly or ironically by nuclear-industry opponents as an example of what they consider "absurd" arguments: "While industry leaders no longer proclaimed that nuclear power would be so plentiful that it would be 'too cheap to meter,' it concocted new lies such as 'no one has ever died from nuclear power,' 'you're more likely to be hit by a meteor than be hurt by a nuclear power accident,' and the fatuous claim by former AEC chairman Dixy Lee Ray that 'a nuclear power plant is infinitely safer than eating, because 300 people choke to death on food every year.' — David Bollier, " Corporate Abuses, Consumer Power http://www.nader.org/history/bollier_chapter_5.html," Chapter 5 of Citizen Action and Other Big Ideas: A History of Ralph Nader and the Modern Consumer Movement. Accessed 28 August 2012.

Stephen King photo

“True Christianity at its most profound is as good as you get. … I think I've been lucky in the period which I've lived through because obviously I would have been for the chop in earlier days.”

R.S. Thomas (1913–2000) Welsh poet

"R. S. Thomas in conversation with Molly Price-Owen" in The David Jones Journal R. S. Thomas Special Issue (Summer/Autumn 2001)
Context: True Christianity at its most profound is as good as you get. … I think I've been lucky in the period which I've lived through because obviously I would have been for the chop in earlier days. The Inquisition would have rooted me out; even in the 19th century I would probably have been had up by a Bishop and asked to change my views, or to keep them to myself etc.... I think that so much of our Christian beliefs … are an attempt to convey through language something which is unsayable.

Related topics