When I read the News24 headline for Pik Botha’s obituary – “A good man working for a bad government” – I was a little taken aback.

After all, this man served under the apartheid government, and “thanks to Botha’s diplomatic successes — and they were considerable, given the odds — the advent of a democratic South Africa was considerably deferred”.

In case you missed the news, Botha passed away last night at the age of 86 at his Pretoria home. He served as foreign affairs minister in the last years of the apartheid government, and then as minister of mineral and energy affairs under Nelson Mandela.

He hung up his political boots in 1996, when the National Party withdrew from the government of national unity, and in 2000‚ he announced that he would join the ANC. He denied joining the party in a 2013 interview, in which he criticised the government’s affirmative action programme.

Still, there are many who consider that too little too late, and Botha’s legacy will always be debated. Back to the News24 obituary, though, and the bit about Pik being fond of drink or three:

Journalists who were assigned to cover these [overseas diplomatic] trips soon learnt that Botha had very little in common with his dour prime minister, and that his legendary reputation as a bon vivant and raconteur was not without foundation.

Simply put, Botha liked to drink – and he often chose to do so with journalists. These “off-duty” moments were often hilarious, especially when Botha was in a mischievous mood.

On one particularly long flight, he filled an ice bucket with the contents of various miniature bottles of spirits to produce a lethal concoction which he passed around like a large African calabash. When that was finished he began “throwing” the empty bottles – as a sangoma with bones – to jokingly predict the journalists’ futures.

On another occasion, this time in Rome, Botha filled a large ceremonial marble skull with grappa and had the press corps drink it. Later, the press corps all joked that it was the first time they’d been drunk “out of someone else’s head”.

The fact that none of these stories surfaced during Botha’s lifetime, and the rule that “what happens on the trip, stays on the trip” was universally upheld, spoke volumes of the fourth estate’s respect for him.

Who amongst us hasn’t sipped from a ceremonial marble skull? I guess that was the fancy 1980s version of the ‘shoey’. If that doesn’t make sense, check this Wikipedia page.

Pik is short for “pikkewyn”, which is Afrikaans for ‘penguin’, as his posture resembled that of the bird whenever he wore a suit.

As you were.

[source:news24]