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National Party (South Africa)

The National Party (Nasionale Party, NP), also known as the Nationalist Party,  was a political party in South Africa from 1914 to 1997, which was responsible for the implementation of apartheid rule. The party was an Afrikaner ethnic nationalist party, which initially promoted the interests of Afrikaners but later became a stalwart promoter and enactor of white supremacy, for which it is best known. It first became the governing party of the country in 1924. It merged with its rival, the SAP, during the Great Depression, and a splinter faction became the official opposition during World War II and returned to power. With the National Party governing South Africa from 4 June 1948 until 9 May 1994, the country for the bulk of this time was only a de jure or partial democracy, as from 1958 onwards non-white people were barred from voting. In 1990, it began to style itself as simply a South African civic nationalist party, and after the fall of apartheid in 1994, attempted to become a moderate conservative one. The party's reputation was damaged irreparably by perpetrating apartheid, and it rebranded itself as the New National Party in 1997 before eventually dissolving in 2005.

Beginning in 1948 following the general election, the party as the governing party of South Africa began implementing its policy of racial segregation, known as apartheid (the Afrikaans term for "separateness"). Although White-minority rule and racial segregation were already in existence in South Africa with non-Whites not having voting rights and efforts made to encourage segregation, apartheid intensified the segregation with stern penalties for non-Whites entering into areas designated for Whites-only without having a pass to permit them to do so (known as the pass laws), interracial marriage and sexual relationships were illegal and punishable offences. Black people faced significant restrictions on property rights. After South Africa was condemned by the British Commonwealth for its policies of apartheid, the NP-led government had South Africa leave the Commonwealth, abandon its monarchy led by the British monarch and become an independent republic. The party's system of apartheid was officially labelled a crime against humanity by the United Nations General Assembly on 16 December 1966.

During the 1970s and 1980s, the NP-led white apartheid government faced internal unrest in South Africa and international pressure for the accommodation of non-Whites in South Africa. It resulted in policies of granting concessions to the non-White population while still retaining the apartheid system, such as the creation of Bantustans that were autonomous self-governing Black homelands (criticised for several of them being broken up into unconnected pieces and that they were still dominated by the White minority South African government), removing legal prohibitions on interracial marriage, and legalising certain non-White and multiracial political parties (excluding the very popular African National Congress (ANC), which the government still viewed as a terrorist organisation). Those identified as Coloureds and Indian South Africans were granted separate legislatures in 1983 alongside the central legislature that represented Whites to provide them self-government while maintaining apartheid, but no such congress was supplied to the Black population as their self-government was to be provided through the Bantustans. The NP-led government began changing laws affected by the apartheid system that had come under heavy domestic and international condemnation, such as removing the pass laws, granting Blacks full property rights that ended previous significant restrictions on Black land ownership, and the right to form trade unions. Following escalating economic sanctions over apartheid, negotiations between the NP-led government led by P. W. Botha and the outlawed ANC led by then-imprisoned Nelson Mandela began in 1987 with Botha seeking to accommodate the ANC's demands and consider releasing Mandela and legalising the ANC on the condition that it would renounce the use of political violence to attain its aims.

In the 1989 South African general election, the party under F. W. de Klerk's leadership declared that it intended to negotiate with the Black South African community for a political solution to accommodate Black South Africans. This resulted in De Klerk declaring in February 1990 the decision to transition South Africa out of apartheid, and permitted the release of Mandela from prison and ending South Africa's ban on the ANC and other anti-apartheid movements, and began negotiations with the ANC for a post-apartheid political system. In September 1990 the party opened up its membership to all racial groups and rebranded itself as no longer being an ethnic nationalist party only representing Afrikaners, but would henceforth be a civic nationalist and conservative party representing all South Africans. However, there was significant opposition among hardliner supporters of apartheid that resulted in De Klerk's government responding to them by holding a national referendum on Apartheid in 1992 for the White population alone that asked them if they supported the government's policy to end apartheid and establish elections open to all South Africans: a large majority voted in favour of the government's policy. In the 1994 elections, it expanded its base to include many non-Whites, including significant support from Coloured and Indian South Africans. It participated in the Government of National Unity between 1994 and 1996. In an attempt to distance itself from its past, the party was renamed the New National Party in 1997. The attempt was largely unsuccessful and the new party decided to merge with the ANC.

Founding and early history
The National Party was founded in Bloemfontein in 1914 by Afrikaner nationalists soon after the establishment of the Union of South Africa. Its founding was rooted in disagreements among South African Party politicians, particularly Prime Minister Louis Botha and his first Minister of Justice, J. B. M. Hertzog. After Hertzog began speaking out publicly against the Botha government's "one-stream" policy in 1912, Botha removed him from the cabinet. Hertzog and his followers in the Orange Free State province subsequently moved to establish the National Party to oppose the government by advocating a "two-stream" policy of equal rights for the English and Afrikaner communities. Afrikaner nationalists in the Transvaal and Cape provinces soon followed suit, so that three distinct provincial NP organisations were in existence in time for the 1915 general elections.

The NP first came to power in coalition with the Labour Party in 1924, with Hertzog as Prime Minister. In 1930 the Hertzog government worked to undermine the vote of Coloureds (South Africans of mixed White and non-White ancestry) by granting the right to vote to White women, thus doubling White political power. In 1934, Hertzog agreed to merge his National Party with the rival South African Party of Jan Smuts to form the United Party. A hardline faction of Afrikaner nationalists led by Daniel François Malan refused to accept the merger and maintained a rump National Party called the Gesuiwerde Nasionale Party (Purified National Party). The Purified National Party used opposition to South African participation in World War II to stir up anti-British feelings amongst Afrikaners. This led to a reunification of the Purified Nationalists with the faction that had merged with the South African Party; together, they formed the Herenigde Nasionale Party (Reunited National Party), which went on to defeat Smuts' United Party in 1948 in coalition with the much smaller Afrikaner Party. In 1951, the two amalgamated to once again become known simply as the National Party.

Apartheid program
Upon taking power after the 1948 general election, the NP began to implement a program of apartheid – the legal system of political, economic and social separation of the races intended to maintain and extend political and economic control of South Africa by the White minority. The party's actions made South Africa for the most part a pariah state across the world. Apartheid was officially labelled a crime against humanity by the United Nations General Assembly on 16 December 1966.

In 1959 the Bantu Self-Government Act established so-called Homelands (sometimes pejoratively called Bantustans) for ten different Black tribes. The ultimate goal of the NP was to move all Black South Africans into one of these homelands (although they might continue to work in South Africa as "guest workers"), leaving what was left of South Africa (about 87 per cent of the land area) with what would then be a White majority, at least on paper. As the apartheid government saw the homelands as embryonic independent nations, all Black South Africans were registered as citizens of the homelands, not of the nation as a whole, and were expected to exercise their political rights only in the homelands. Accordingly, the three token parliamentary seats reserved for White representatives of Black South Africans in the Cape Province were scrapped. The other three provinces – Transvaal Province, the Orange Free State Province, and Natal Province had never allowed any Black representation.

Coloureds were removed from the Common Roll of Cape Province in 1953. Instead of voting for the same representatives as White South Africans, they could now vote only for four White representatives to speak for them. Later, in 1968, the Coloureds were disenfranchised altogether. In the place of the four parliamentary seats, a partially elected body was set up to advise the government in an amendment to the Separate Representation of Voters Act. This made the electorate entirely White, as Indian South Africans had never had any representation.

In a move unrecognised by the rest of the world, the former German colony of South West Africa (now Namibia), which South Africa had occupied in World War I, was effectively incorporated into South Africa as a League of Nations mandate, with seven members elected to represent its White citizens in the Parliament of South Africa. The White minority of South West Africa, predominantly Germans and Afrikaners, considered its interests akin to those of the Afrikaners in South Africa and therefore supported the National Party in subsequent elections.

These reforms bolstered the NP politically, as they removed Black and Coloured influence – which was hostile to the NP – from the electoral process and incorporated the pro-nationalist Whites of South-West Africa. The NP increased its parliamentary majority in almost every election between 1948 and 1977.

Numerous segregation laws had been passed before the NP took power in 1948. Among the most significant were the 'Natives Land Act, No 27 of 1913', and the 'Natives (Urban Areas) Act of 1923'. The former made it illegal for Blacks to purchase or lease land from Whites except in reserves, which restricted Black occupancy to less than eight percent of South Africa's land. The latter laid the foundations for residential segregation in urban areas. Apartheid laws passed by the NP after 1948 included the 'Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act', the 'Immorality Act', the 'Population Registration Act', and the 'Group Areas Act', which prohibited non-white males from being in certain areas of the country (especially at night) unless they were employed there.

From Dominion to republic
The NP strongly advocated republicanism, a sentiment rooted in Boer history. Beginning in 1836, waves of Boers began to migrate north from the Cape Colony to live beyond the reach of the British colonial administration. Eventually, the migrating Boers founded three republics in southern Africa: the Natalia Republic, the South African Republic and the Orange Free State. British colonial expansion in the 19th century led to the annexation of the Natalia Republic by Britain and the First and Second Boer Wars, which resulted in the South African Republic and the Orange Free State being annexed into the Empire as well.

Despite Britain's victory in the Second Boer War, Afrikaners resisted British control in southern Africa. In 1914, a group of anti-British Afrikaners led the Maritz rebellion against the Union of South Africa during World War I; two years later, an NP congress called for South Africa to become a republic before changing its mind and deciding that it was too early. The Afrikaner Broederbond, a secret organization founded in 1918 to support the interests of Afrikaners in South Africa, soon became a powerful force in the South African political scene. The Republican Bond was established in the 1930s, and other republican organisations such as the Purified National Party, the Voortrekkers, Noodhulpliga (First-Aid League) and the Federasie van Afrikaanse Kultuurverenigings (Federation of Afrikaans Cultural Organisations) also came into being. There was a widespread outpouring of nationalist sentiment around the 1938 centenary of the Great Trek and the Battle of Blood River. It was seen to signify the perpetuation of white South African culture, and anti-British and pro-republican feelings grew more assertive.

It was obvious in political circles that the Union of South Africa was headed inevitably towards republicanism. Although it remained a Dominion after unification in 1910, the country was granted increased amounts of self-government; indeed, it already had complete autonomy on specific issues. It was agreed in 1910 that the South African government would look after domestic matters but that the country's external affairs would remain British-controlled.

Hertzog's trip to the 1919 Paris Peace Conference was a definite (if failed) attempt to gain independence. In 1926, however, the Balfour Declaration was passed, affording every British dominion within the British Empire equal rank and bestowing upon them their right of the direction of foreign issues. This resulted the following year in the institution of South Africa's first-ever Department of Foreign Affairs. 1931 saw a backtrack as the Statute of Westminster resolved that British Dominions could not have "total" control over their external concerns, but in 1934 the Status and Seals Acts were passed, granting the South African Parliament even greater power than the British government over the Union.

The extreme NP members of the 1930s were known collectively as the Republikeinse Bond. The following organisations, parties and events promoted the Republican ideal in the 1930s:

 * The Broederbond
 * The Purified National Party
 * The FAK
 * The Voortrekkers and Noodhulpliga
 * The 1938 Great Trek Centenary
 * The Reddingsdaadbond
 * The Ossewabrandwag
 * Pirow's Nuwe Orde (New Order)
 * The adjustment to Die Stem and the national flag

Daniël François Malan

There was some confusion about the republican ideal during the war years. The Herenigde Nasionale Party, with Hertzog its leader, pushed the issue into the background. After Hertzog left the party, however, it became republican. In 1942 and 1944, D. F. Malan introduced a motion in the House of Assembly in favour of the establishment of a republic, but this was defeated.

When the NP came to power in 1948 (making it the first all-Afrikaner cabinet since 1910), there were two uppermost priorities that it was determined to fulfil:

 * Find a solution to the racial problem.
 * Lead South Africa to independence and republican status.

Between 1948 and 1961, Prime Ministers D. F. Malan, J. G. Strijdom and Hendrik Verwoerd all worked very hard for the latter, implementing a battery of policies and changes in a bid to increase the country's autonomy. Divided loyalty, they felt, was holding South Africa back. They wanted to break the country's ties with the United Kingdom and establish a republic, and many South Africans grew confident that a republic was possible.

Unfortunately for its republicans, the NP was not in a strong parliamentary position. Although it held a majority (only five) of seats, many of these were in rural constituencies, which had far fewer voters than urban constituencies. Malan appealed to many rural voters due to his agricultural policy, meaning black workers relied on white farmers for work, fuelling his quest for a segregated nation. The United Party held a 100,000-vote lead. Consequently, the NP had to rely on the Afrikaner Party's support. It did not, therefore, have the groundswell of public support that it needed to win a referendum, and only when it had that majority on its side could a referendum be held on the republican matter. However, with a small seating majority and a total vote-tally minority, it was impossible for now for Malan and his ardently republican Nats to bring about a republic constitutionally. In the interim, the NP would have to consolidate itself and not antagonise the British.

Many English speakers did not want to break their ties with the United Kingdom. However, in 1949, at the 1949 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference in London (with Malan in attendance), India requested that, despite its newly attained republican status, it remain a member of the British Commonwealth. When this was granted the following year by the London Declaration, It roused much debate in South Africa between the pro-republican NP and the anti-republican UP (under Strauss). It meant that, even if South Africa did become a republic, it did not automatically have to sever all of its ties with the UK and the British Commonwealth. This gained the movement further support from the English-speaking populace, which was less worried about being isolated, and the republican ideal looked closer than ever to being fulfilled.

Although he could not make South Africa a republic, Malan could prepare the country for this eventuality. In his term of office, from 1948 to 1954, Malan took several steps to break ties with the UK:

 * The South African Citizenship Act was passed in 1949. Before, South Africans were not citizens but rather subjects of the British Crown, regardless of whether they were permanent residents or had only recently migrated. The 1949 Act established South African citizenship. Before, British citizens needed a mere two years in the country to qualify as South Africans; now, British immigrants were just like any other immigrant: they would have to register and remain in South Africa for five years to become citizens of the country. It was believed that this could well influence a republican referendum. The Act ensured that the British immigrant population would not reduce the Afrikaner majority.
 * In 1950, the right of appeal to the British Privy Council in London was terminated under the Privy Council Appeals Act. The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in Bloemfontein was now South Africa's highest court.
 * Malan was a crucial player in the move to get the word "British" taken away from "British Commonwealth". This change was taken as an affirmation of the fact that all member countries were voluntary and equal members.
 * In 1951, pro-republican Ernest George Jansen was assigned the post of Governor-General of South Africa. This endorsed the idea of Afrikaner leadership.
 * The title of the just-crowned Queen was modified in 1953 from "Elizabeth II, Queen of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions beyond the Seas" to "Elizabeth II, Queen of South Africa". This was meant to indicate that the South African upper house had bequeathed the title upon her.

The 1953 ballot votes saw the NP fortify its position considerably, winning comfortably but still falling well short of the clear majority it sought: it had 94 seats in parliament to the UP's 57 and the Labour Party's five.

Hans Strijdom

Malan retired in 1954 at the age of eighty. The two succession contenders were J. G. Strijdom (Minister of Lands and Irrigation) and Havenga (Minister of Finance). Malan personally preferred the latter and, indeed, recommended him. Malan and Strijdom had clashed frequently over the years, particularly on the question of whether a republican South Africa should be inside or outside the Commonwealth.

Strijdom, however, had the support of Verwoerd and Ben Schoeman, and he was eventually voted in as Prime Minister. Strijdom was a passionate and outspoken Afrikaner and republican who wholeheartedly supported apartheid. He was completely intolerant towards non-Afrikaners and liberal ideas, utterly determined to maintain White rule with zero compromise. Known as the "Lion of the North", Strijdom made few changes to his cabinet and pursued with vigour the policy of apartheid. By 1956, he successfully placed the Coloureds on a separate voters' roll, thus further weakening ties with the Commonwealth and gaining support for the NP.

He also took several other steps to make South Africa less dependent on Britain:

 * In 1955, the South African parliament became recognised as the highest authority.
 * In 1957, following a motion from Arthur Barlow MP, the flag of the Union of South Africa became the country's only flag; the Union Jack, alongside which the Union Flag had flown since 1928, was flown no longer, to be hoisted only on special occasions.
 * Likewise, "Die Stem van Suid-Afrika" (The Call of South Africa) became South Africa's only national anthem and was also translated into English to appease the relevant population. God Save the Queen would be sung only on occasions relating to the UK or the Commonwealth.
 * In 1957, the maritime base in Simonstown was reassigned from the command of the British Royal Navy to that of the South African government. The British had occupied Simonstown since 1806.
 * In 1958, "OHMS" was replaced by "Official" on all official documents.
 * C. R. Swart, another staunch Afrikaner republican, became the new Governor-General.

Anti-republican South Africans recognised the shift and distancing from Britain, and the UP grew increasingly anxious, doing all it could to persuade Parliament to retain Commonwealth links. Strijdom, however, declared that South Africa's participation (or otherwise) in the Commonwealth would be determined only by its best interests.

Hendrik Verwoerd
The question of apartheid dominated the 1958 election, and the NP took 55% of the vote, thus winning a clear majority for the first time. When Strijdom died that same year, there was a tripartite succession contest between Swart, Dönges and Verwoerd. The latter, devoted to the cause of a republican South Africa, was the new Prime Minister. Verwoerd, a former Minister of Native Affairs, played a leading role in the institution of the apartheid system. Under his leadership, the NP solidified its control over South African apartheid-era politics.

To gain the support of the English-identified population of South Africa, Verwoerd appointed several English speakers to his cabinet. He also cited the radical political movements elsewhere in Africa as vindication of his belief that White and Black nationalism could not work within the same system. Verwoerd also presented the NP as the party best equipped to deal with the widely perceived threat of communism.

By the end of his term (caused by his assassination), Verwoerd had solidified the NP's domination of South African politics. In the 1966 elections the party won 126 out of the 170 seats in Parliament.

By 1960, however, much of the South African electorate called for withdrawal from the Commonwealth and establishing South Africa as a republic. It was decided that a republican referendum was to be held in October. International circumstances made the referendum a growing necessity. In the aftermath of the World War II, former British colonies in Africa and Asia were gaining independence and publicising the ills of apartheid. Commonwealth members were determined to isolate South Africa.

There were numerous internal factors which had paved the way for and may be viewed as influences on the result:

 * Harold Macmillan's "Winds of Change" speech, in which he declared that independence for Black Africans was an inevitability;
 * Many Whites were unwilling to give up apartheid and realised that South Africa would have to go for it alone if it was to pursue its racial policies.
 * The assertion that economic growth and relaxation of racial tensions could be achieved only through a republic;
 * The Sharpeville Massacre;
 * The attempted assassination of Verwoerd; and, most importantly,
 * The 1960 census revealed more Afrikaners in the country than English, thus almost guaranteeing the NP victory in a republican referendum.

The opposition accused Verwoerd of trying to break from the Commonwealth and the West, thus losing South Africa's trade preferences. The NP, however, launched a vigorously enthusiastic political campaign with widely advertised public meetings. The opposition found it very difficult to fight for the preservation of British links.

There were numerous pro-republican arguments:

 * It would link more closely the two European language groups.
 * It would eliminate confusion about South Africa's constitutional position.
 * The monarchy was essentially British, with no roots in South Africa.
 * South Africans desired a home-grown Head of State.
 * The Queen of South Africa, living abroad, inherited her title as the United Kingdom's monarch without the assistance or approval of South Africa.
 * In a republic, the Head of State would not be another country's ruler but rather the elected representative of the nation, a unifying symbol.
 * A republic symbolised a sovereign free, and independent state.
 * South Africa could approach its internal problems more realistically since they would be strictly "South African" problems to be solved by South Africans rather than foreign intervention.
 * It would clear the misconception amongst many Blacks in South Africa that foreigners had the final say in their affairs.

There were also numerous arguments the establishment of a republic:

 * It could lead to a forced withdrawal from the Commonwealth.
 * With the entire world in a state of political unrest, bordering on turmoil, it was dangerous to change South Africa's political status.
 * It could lead to isolation from allies.
 * A republic would solve none of South Africa's problems; it would only worsen them, especially the racial issue, to which the Commonwealth was increasingly opposed.
 * The NP had supposedly not given one good reason for the change.
 * The ruling party already had twelve years to bring about national unity but had only driven the two White sects further apart.
 * A majority of just one vote could establish a republic. This did not entail unity nor, indeed, democracy.
 * Countries did not generally change their form of government unless the present form was inefficient or unstable due to internal strife or hardship. Nothing like this had happened in (White) South Africa, where so many were so content.

On 5 October 1960, 90.5% of the White electorate turned out to vote on the issue. 850,458 (52%) voted in favour of a republic, while 775,878 were against it. The Cape, Orange Free State and Transvaal were all in favour; Natal, a mainly English-speaking province, was not. It was a narrow victory for the republicans. However, a considerable number of Afrikaners did vote against the measure. The few Blacks, Indians and Coloureds allowed to vote were decidedly against the measure.

English speakers who voted for a republic had done so on the condition that their cultural heritage be safeguarded. Many had associated a republic with the survival of the White South Africans. Macmillan's speech illustrated that the British government was no longer prepared to stand by South Africa's racist policies. Nevertheless, the referendum was a significant victory for Afrikaner nationalism as British political and cultural influence waned in South Africa.

However, one question remained after the referendum: would South Africa become a republic outside the Commonwealth (the outcome favoured by the most Afrikaner nationalists)? Withdrawal from the Commonwealth would likely alienate English speakers and damage relations with many other countries. Former British colonies such as India, Pakistan and Ghana were all republics within the Commonwealth, and Verwoerd announced that South Africa would follow suit "if possible".

In January 1961, Verwoerd's government enacted legislation to transform the Union of South Africa into the Republic of South Africa. The constitution was finalised in April. It merged the authority of the British Crown and Governor-General into a new post, State President of South Africa. The State President would have relatively little political power, serving more as the ceremonial head of state. The political power was to lie with the Prime Minister (head of government). The Republic of South Africa would also have its monetary system, employing Rand and Cents.

In March 1961, Verwoerd visited the 1961 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference in London to discuss South Africa becoming a republic within the Commonwealth, presenting the Republic of South Africa's application for a renewal of its membership to the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth had earlier declined to predict how republican status would affect South Africa's membership; it did not want to be seen meddling in its members' domestic affairs. However, many of the Conference's affiliates (prominent among them the Afro-Asia group and Canadian Prime Minister John Diefenbaker) attacked South Africa's racial policies and rebuffed Verwoerd's application; they would go to any lengths to expel South Africa from the Commonwealth. Numerous anti-apartheid movements also campaigned for South Africa's exclusion from the UK. Some member countries warned that they would pull out of the organisation unless South Africa were expelled. Verwoerd disregarded the censure, arguing that his Commonwealth cohorts had no right to question and criticise his country's domestic affairs. On this issue, he even had the support of his parliamentary opposition.

Thus, on 15 March 1961, ostensibly to Britain an awkward decision and causing a split within the Commonwealth, but more likely to avoid further condemnation and embarrassment, Verwoerd withdrew his application and announced that South Africa would become a republic outside the Commonwealth. His decision was received with regret by the Prime Ministers of the UK, Australia and New Zealand but was met with obvious approval from South Africa's critics. Verwoerd said the next day that the move would not affect South Africa's relationship with the United Kingdom. On his homecoming, he was met with a rapturous reception. Afrikaner nationalists were not deterred by the relinquishment of Commonwealth membership, for they regarded the Commonwealth as little more than the British Empire in disguise. They believed that South Africa and the United Kingdom had absolutely nothing in common, and even UP leader Sir De Villiers Graaff praised Verwoerd for his handling of the situation.

On 31 May 1961, South Africa became a republic. The date was a significant one in Afrikaner history, as it heralded the anniversary of several historical events, the 1902 Treaty of Vereeniging, which ended the Anglo-Boer War; South Africa's becoming a union in 1910; and the first hoisting of the Union flag in 1928. The Afrikaner republican dream had finally come to reality.

The significance of Commonwealth withdrawal turned out to be less than expected. It was not necessary for South Africa to amend its trading preferences, and Prime Minister Macmillan reciprocated Verwoerd's assurance that withdrawal would not alter trade between South Africa and the UK.

South Africa now had its first independent constitution. However, the only real constitutional change was that the State President, in charge for seven years, would assume the now-vacant position of the Queen as Head of State. C. R. Swart, the State President-elect, took the first republican oath as State President of South Africa before Chief Justice L.C. Steyn (DRC).

Although White inhabitants were generally happy with the republic, united in their support of Verwoerd, the Blacks defiantly rejected the move. Nelson Mandela and his National Action Council demonstrated from 29 to 31 May 1961. The republican issue would strongly intensify resistance to apartheid.

Support
The NP won most parliamentary seats in all elections during the apartheid era. Its popular vote record was more mixed: While it won the popular vote with a comfortable margin in most general elections, the NP carried less than 50% of the electorate in 1948, 1953, 1961, and 1989. In 1977, the NP got its best-ever result in the elections with the support of 64.8% of the White voters and 134 parliamentary seats out of 165. After this, the party's consent declined as a proliferation of right-wing parties siphoned off important segments of its traditional voter base.

Throughout its reign, the party's support came mainly from Afrikaners, but other White people were courted by and increasingly voted for the NP after 1960. By the 1980s, however, in reaction to the "verligte" reforms of P. W. Botha, the majority of Afrikaners drifted to the Conservative Party of Andries Treurnicht, who called for a return to the traditional policies of the NP. In the 1974 general elections for example 91% of Afrikaners voted for the NP; however, in the 1989 general elections, only 46% of Afrikaners cast their ballot for the National party.

Factional warfare: "Verkramptes" and "Verligtes"
Following the assassination of Verwoerd, John Vorster took over as party leader and Prime Minister. From the 1960s onwards, the NP and the Afrikaner population in general was increasingly divided over the application of apartheid (the legal opposition being similarly divided over its response), leading to the emergence of the "verkramptes" and "verligtes". Verkramptes were members of the party's right-wing who opposed any deviation from the rigid apartheid structure. Verligtes took a somewhat more moderate stance towards racial issues, primarily from a pragmatic standpoint over fears of international scrutiny should reforms fail to be made.

In addition to the question of apartheid, the two factions were divided over such issues as immigration, language, racially-mixed sporting teams, and engagement with Black African states. In 1969, members of the "verkrampte" faction including Albert Hertzog and Jaap Marais, formed the Herstigte Nasionale Party, which claimed to be the true upholder of pure Verwoerdian apartheid ideology and continues to exist today. While it never had much electoral success, it attracted sufficient numbers to erode support for the government at crucial points, although not to the extent that the Conservative Party would do. Meanwhile, the verligtes began to gain some traction inside the party in response to growing international opposition to apartheid.

Perhaps a precursor to the split came around 1960 when Japie Basson, a moderate, was expelled for disagreements on racial questions and would form his own National Union Party, he would later join the United Party and Progressive Federal Party before rejoining the NP in the 1980s. Former Interior Minister Theo Gerdener formed the Democratic Party in 1973 to attempt its own verligte solution to racial questions.

National Party under Botha
Beginning in the early 1980s, under the leadership of P. W. Botha, Prime Minister since 1978, the NP began to reform its policies. Botha legalised interracial marriages and multiracial political parties and relaxed the Group Areas Act. Botha also amended the constitution to grant a measure of political representation to Coloureds and Indians by creating separate parliamentary chambers in which they had control of their "own affairs". The amendments also replaced the parliamentary system with a presidential one. The powers of the Prime Minister were essentially merged with those of the State President, which was vested with sweeping executive powers. Although portraying the new system as a power-sharing agreement, Botha ensured that the real power remained in White hands, and in practice, in the hands of the NP. Whites had large majorities in the electoral college which chose the State President, as well as on the President's Council, which settled disputes between the three chambers and decided which combination of them could consider any piece of legislation. However, Botha and the NP refused to budge on the central issue of granting meaningful political rights to Black South Africans, who remained unrepresented even after the reforms. Most Black political organisations remained banned, and prominent Black leaders, including Nelson Mandela, remained imprisoned.

While Botha's reforms did not even begin to meet the opposition's demands, they sufficiently alarmed a segment of his own party to engender a second split. In 1982, hardline NP members including Andries Treurnicht and Ferdinand Hartzenberg formed the Conservative Party, committed to reversing Botha's reforms, which by 1987 became the largest parliamentary opposition party. The party later merged into the Freedom Front, which today represents Afrikaner nationalism. On the other hand, some reformist NP members also left the party, such as Dennis Worrall and Wynand Malan, who formed the Independent Party which later merged into the Democratic Party (a similar breakaway group existed for a time in the 1970s). The loss of NP support to both the DP and CP reflected the divisions among White voters over continued maintenance of apartheid.

National Party under de Klerk and final years of apartheid
In the midst of rising political instability, growing economic problems and diplomatic isolation, Botha resigned as NP leader, and subsequently as State President in 1989. He was replaced by F. W. de Klerk in this capacity. Although conservative by inclination, De Klerk had become the leader of an "enlightened" NP faction that realised the impracticality of maintaining apartheid forever. He decided that it would be better to negotiate while there was still time to reach a compromise, than to hold out until forced to negotiate on less favourable terms later. He persuaded the NP to enter into negotiations with representatives of the Black community. Late in 1989, the NP won the most bitterly contested election in decades, pledging to negotiate an end to the very apartheid system that it had established.

On 2 February 1990, the African National Congress (ANC) was legalised, and Nelson Mandela was released after twenty-seven years of imprisonment. In the same year, the NP opened its membership to all racial groups and moves began to repeal the racial legislation which had been the foundations of apartheid. A referendum in 1992 gave De Klerk plenipotentiary powers to negotiate with Mandela. Following the negotiations, a new interim constitution was drawn up, and non-racial democratic elections were held in 1994. These elections were won by the African National Congress. The NP remained in government, however, as a coalition partner to the ANC in the Government of National Unity until 30 June 1996, when it withdrew to become the official opposition.

Post-apartheid era
The National Party won 20.39% of the vote and 82 seats in the National Assembly at the first multiracial election in 1994. This support extended well beyond the White community and into other minority groups. For instance, two-thirds of Indian South Africans voted for the NP. It became the official opposition in most provinces and also won a majority in the Western Cape, winning much of the White and Coloured vote. Its Coloured support also earned it a strong second place in the Northern Cape. The party was wracked by internal wranglings whilst it participated in the Government of National Unity, and finally withdrew from the government to become the official opposition in 1996. Despite this, it remained uncertain about its future direction, and was continually outperformed in parliament by the much smaller Democratic Party (DP), which provided a more forceful and principled opposition stance. In 1997, its voter base began to gradually shift to the DP. The NP renamed itself the New National Party towards the end of 1997, to distance itself from the apartheid past.

However, the NNP would quickly disappear from the political scene, faring poorly at both the 1999 and 2004 general elections. After initially aligning with the DP in 2000 (forming the Democratic Alliance), the merger was aborted, and after a back and forth on whether to oppose or work with the ANC, the NNP and ANC finally formed an alliance in late-2001. After years of losing members and support to other parties, the NNP's collapse in its previous stronghold in the Western Cape at the 2004 general election proved to be the final straw; its federal council voted to dissolve the party on 9 April 2005, following a decision the previous year to merge with the ANC.

Re-establishment
On 5 August 2008 a new party using the name of "National Party South Africa" was formed and registered with the Independent Electoral Commission. The new party had no formal connection with the now defunct New National Party. The relaunched National Party of 2008 pushes for a non-racial democratic South Africa based on federal principles and the legacy of F. W. de Klerk.

Notable people

 * Vera Reitzer (1921–2006) Hungarian-born Jewish holocaust survivor, and National Party member

title: National Party (South Africa)


text:
Klein quartic

In hyperbolic geometry, the Klein quartic, named after Felix Klein, is a compact Riemann surface of genus $3$ with the highest possible order automorphism group for this genus, namely order $168$ orientation-preserving automorphisms, and $168 × 2 = 336$ automorphisms if orientation may be reversed. As such, the Klein quartic is the Hurwitz surface of lowest possible genus; see Hurwitz's automorphisms theorem. Its (orientation-preserving) automorphism group is isomorphic to $PSL(2, 7)$, the second-smallest non-abelian simple group after the alternating group A5. The quartic was first described in.

Klein's quartic occurs in many branches of mathematics, in contexts including representation theory, homology theory, Fermat's Last Theorem, and the Stark–Heegner theorem on imaginary quadratic number fields of class number one; see for a survey of properties.

Originally, the "Klein quartic" referred specifically to the subset of the complex projective plane $P^{2}(C)$ defined by an algebraic equation. This has a specific Riemannian metric (that makes it a minimal surface in $P^{2}(C)$), under which its Gaussian curvature is not constant. But more commonly (as in this article) it is now thought of as any Riemann surface that is conformally equivalent to this algebraic curve, and especially the one that is a quotient of the hyperbolic plane $H^{2}$ by a certain cocompact group $G$ that acts freely on $H^{2}$ by isometries. This gives the Klein quartic a Riemannian metric of constant curvature $−1$ that it inherits from $H^{2}$. This set of conformally equivalent Riemannian surfaces is precisely the same as all compact Riemannian surfaces of genus 3 whose conformal automorphism group is isomorphic to the unique simple group of order 168. This group is also known as $PSL(2, 7)$, and also as the isomorphic group $PSL(3, 2)$. By covering space theory, the group $G$ mentioned above is isomorphic to the fundamental group of the compact surface of genus $3$.

Closed and open forms
It is important to distinguish two different forms of the quartic. The closed quartic is what is generally meant in geometry; topologically it has genus 3 and is a compact space. The open or "punctured" quartic is of interest in number theory; topologically it is a genus 3 surface with 24 punctures, and geometrically these punctures are cusps. The open quartic may be obtained (topologically) from the closed quartic by puncturing at the 24 centers of the tiling by regular heptagons, as discussed below. The open and closed quartics have different metrics, though they are both hyperbolic and complete – geometrically, the cusps are "points at infinity", not holes, hence the open quartic is still complete.

As an algebraic curve
The Klein quartic can be viewed as a projective algebraic curve over the complex numbers $C$, defined by the following quartic equation in homogeneous coordinates $[x:y:z]$ on $P^{2}(C)$:

 * $$x^3y + y^3z + z^3x = 0.$$

The locus of this equation in $P^{2}(C)$ is the original Riemannian surface that Klein described.

Quaternion algebra construction
The compact Klein quartic can be constructed as the quotient of the hyperbolic plane by the action of a suitable Fuchsian group $Γ(I)$ which is the principal congruence subgroup associated with the ideal $$I=\langle \eta-2\rangle$$ in the ring of algebraic integers $Z(η)$ of the field $Q(η)$ where $η = 2 cos(2π/7)$. Note the identity

 * $$(2-\eta)^3= 7(\eta-1)^2,$$

exhibiting $2 – η$ as a prime factor of 7 in the ring of algebraic integers.

The group $Γ(I)$ is a subgroup of the (2,3,7) hyperbolic triangle group. Namely, $Γ(I)$ is a subgroup of the group of elements of unit norm in the quaternion algebra generated as an associative algebra by the generators $i,j$ and relations

 * $$i^2=j^2=\eta, \qquad ij=-ji.$$

One chooses a suitable Hurwitz quaternion order $$\mathcal Q_{\mathrm{Hur}}$$ in the quaternion algebra, $Γ(I)$ is then the group of norm 1 elements in $$1+I\mathcal Q_{\mathrm{Hur}}$$. The least absolute value of a trace of a hyperbolic element in $Γ(I)$ is $$\eta^2+3\eta+2$$, corresponding the value 3.936 for the systole of the Klein quartic, one of the highest in this genus.

Tiling
The Klein quartic admits tilings connected with the symmetry group (a "regular map" ), and these are used in understanding the symmetry group, dating back to Klein's original paper. Given a fundamental domain for the group action (for the full, orientation-reversing symmetry group, a (2,3,7) triangle), the reflection domains (images of this domain under the group) give a tiling of the quartic such that the automorphism group of the tiling equals the automorphism group of the surface – reflections in the lines of the tiling correspond to the reflections in the group (reflections in the lines of a given fundamental triangle give a set of 3 generating reflections). This tiling is a quotient of the order-3 bisected heptagonal tiling of the hyperbolic plane (the universal cover of the quartic), and all Hurwitz surfaces are tiled in the same way, as quotients.

This tiling is uniform but not regular (it is by scalene triangles), and often regular tilings are used instead. A quotient of any tiling in the (2,3,7) family can be used (and will have the same automorphism group); of these, the two regular tilings are the tiling by 24 regular hyperbolic heptagons, each of degree 3 (meeting at 56 vertices), and the dual tiling by 56 equilateral triangles, each of degree 7 (meeting at 24 vertices). The order of the automorphism group is related, being the number of polygons times the number of edges in the polygon in both cases.
 * 24 × 7 = 168
 * 56 × 3 = 168

The covering tilings on the hyperbolic plane are the order-3 heptagonal tiling and the order-7 triangular tiling.

The automorphism group can be augmented (by a symmetry which is not realized by a symmetry of the tiling) to yield the Mathieu group M24.

Corresponding to each tiling of the quartic (partition of the quartic variety into subsets) is an abstract polyhedron, which abstracts from the geometry and only reflects the combinatorics of the tiling (this is a general way of obtaining an abstract polytope from a tiling) – the vertices, edges, and faces of the polyhedron are equal as sets to the vertices, edges, and faces of the tiling, with the same incidence relations, and the (combinatorial) automorphism group of the abstract polyhedron equals the (geometric) automorphism group of the quartic. In this way the geometry reduces to combinatorics.

Affine quartic
The above is a tiling of the projective quartic (a closed manifold); the affine quartic has 24 cusps (topologically, punctures), which correspond to the 24 vertices of the regular triangular tiling, or equivalently the centers of the 24 heptagons in the heptagonal tiling, and can be realized as follows.

Considering the action of $SL(2, R)$ on the upper half-plane model $H^{2}$ of the hyperbolic plane by Möbius transformations, the affine Klein quartic can be realized as the quotient $Γ(7)\H^{2}$. (Here $Γ(7)$ is the congruence subgroup of $SL(2, Z)$ consisting of matrices that are congruent to the identity matrix when all entries are taken modulo 7.)

Fundamental domain and pants decomposition
The Klein quartic can be obtained as the quotient of the hyperbolic plane by the action of a Fuchsian group. The fundamental domain is a regular 14-gon, which has area $$8\pi$$ by the Gauss-Bonnet theorem. This can be seen in the adjoining figure, which also includes the 336 (2,3,7) triangles that tessellate the surface and generate its group of symmetries. Within the tessellation by (2,3,7) triangles is a tessellation by 24 regular heptagons. The systole of the surface passes through the midpoints of 8 heptagon sides; for this reason it has been referred to as an "eight step geodesic" in the literature, and is the reason for the title of the book in the section below. All the coloured curves in the figure showing the pants decomposition are systoles, however, this is just a subset; there are 21 in total. The length of the systole is
 * $$16\sinh^{-1}\left(\left(\tfrac{1}{2}\sqrt{\csc^2\left(\tfrac{\pi}{7}\right)-4}\right)\sin\left(\tfrac{\pi}{7}\right)\right)\approx3.93594624883.$$

An equivalent closed formula is

 * $$8\cosh^{-1}\left(\tfrac{3}{2}-2\sin^2\left(\tfrac{\pi}{7}\right)\right).$$

Whilst the Klein quartic maximises the symmetry group for surfaces of genus 3, it does not maximise the systole length. The conjectured maximiser is the surface referred to as "M3". M3 comes from a tessellation of (2,3,12) triangles, and its systole has multiplicity 24 and length
 * $$2\cosh^{-1}\left(2+\sqrt{3}\right)\approx3.9833047820988736.$$

The Klein quartic can be decomposed into four pairs of pants by cutting along six of its systoles. This decomposition gives a symmetric set of Fenchel-Nielsen coordinates, where the length parameters are all equal to the length of the systole, and the twist parameters are all equal to $$\tfrac{1}{8}$$ of the length of the systole. In particular, taking $$l(S)$$ to be the systole length, the coordinates are

 * $$\left\{l(S),\tfrac{l(S)}{8};l(S),\tfrac{l(S)}{8};l(S),\tfrac{l(S)}{8};l(S),\tfrac{l(S)}{8};l(S),\tfrac{l(S)}{8};l(S),\tfrac{l(S)}{8}\right\}.$$

The cubic graph corresponding to this pants decomposition is the tetrahedral graph, that is, the graph of 4 nodes, each connected to the other 3. The tetrahedral graph is similar to the graph for the projective Fano plane; indeed, the automorphism group of the Klein quartic is isomorphic to that of the Fano plane.

Spectral theory

Little has been proved about the spectral theory of the Klein quartic. Because the Klein quartic has the largest symmetry group of surfaces in its topological class, much like the Bolza surface in genus 2, it has been conjectured that it maximises the first positive eigenvalue of the Laplace operator among all compact Riemann surfaces of genus 3 with constant negative curvature. It also maximizes mutliplicity of the first positive eigenvalue (8) among all such surfaces, a fact that has been recently proved. Eigenvalues of the Klein quartic have been calculated to varying degrees of accuracy. The first 15 distinct positive eigenvalues are shown in the following table, along with their multiplicities.

3-dimensional models
The Klein quartic cannot be realized as a 3-dimensional figure, in the sense that no 3-dimensional figure has (rotational) symmetries equal to $PSL(2,7)$, since $PSL(2,7)$ does not embed as a subgroup of $SO(3)$ (or $O(3)$) – it does not have a (non-trivial) 3-dimensional linear representation over the real numbers.

However, many 3-dimensional models of the Klein quartic have been given, starting in Klein's original paper,   which seek to demonstrate features of the quartic and preserve the symmetries topologically, though not all geometrically. The resulting models most often have either tetrahedral (order 12) or octahedral (order 24) symmetries; the remaining order 7 symmetry cannot be as easily visualized, and in fact is the title of Klein's paper.

Most often, the quartic is modeled either by a smooth genus 3 surface with tetrahedral symmetry (replacing the edges of a regular tetrahedron with tubes/handles yields such a shape), which have been dubbed "tetruses", or by polyhedral approximations, which have been dubbed "tetroids"; in both cases this is an embedding of the shape in 3 dimensions. The most notable smooth model (tetrus) is the sculpture The Eightfold Way by Helaman Ferguson at the Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute in Berkeley, California, made of marble and serpentine, and unveiled on November 14, 1993. The title refers to the fact that starting at any vertex of the triangulated surface and moving along any edge, if you alternately turn left and right when reaching a vertex, you always return to the original point after eight edges. The acquisition of the sculpture led in due course to the publication of a book of papers, detailing properties of the quartic and containing the first English translation of Klein's paper. Polyhedral models with tetrahedral symmetry most often have convex hull a truncated tetrahedron – see and  for examples and illustrations. Some of these models consist of 20 triangles or 56 triangles (abstractly, the regular skew polyhedron {3,7|,4}, with 56 faces, 84 edges, and 24 vertices), which cannot be realized as equilateral, with twists in the arms of the tetrahedron; while others have 24 heptagons – these heptagons can be taken to be planar, though non-convex, and the models are more complex than the triangular ones because the complexity is reflected in the shapes of the (non-flexible) heptagonal faces, rather than in the (flexible) vertices.

Alternatively, the quartic can be modeled by a polyhedron with octahedral symmetry: Klein modeled the quartic by a shape with octahedral symmetries and with points at infinity (an "open polyhedron"), namely three hyperboloids meeting on orthogonal axes, while it can also be modeled as a closed polyhedron which must be immersed (have self-intersections), not embedded. Such polyhedra may have various convex hulls, including the truncated cube, the snub cube, or the rhombicuboctahedron, as in the small cubicuboctahedron at right. The small cubicuboctahedron immersion is obtained by joining some of the triangles (2 triangles form a square, 6 form an octagon), which can be visualized by coloring the triangles (the corresponding tiling is topologically but not geometrically the 3 4 | 4 tiling). This immersion can also be used to geometrically construct the Mathieu group M24 by adding to PSL(2,7) the permutation which interchanges opposite points of the bisecting lines of the squares and octagons.

Dessin d'enfants
The dessin d'enfant on the Klein quartic associated with the quotient map by its automorphism group (with quotient the Riemann sphere) is precisely the 1-skeleton of the order-3 heptagonal tiling. That is, the quotient map is ramified over the points $0, 1728$, and $∞$; dividing by 1728 yields a Belyi function (ramified at $0, 1$, and $∞$), where the 56 vertices (black points in dessin) lie over 0, the midpoints of the 84 edges (white points in dessin) lie over 1, and the centers of the 24 heptagons lie over infinity. The resulting dessin is a "platonic" dessin, meaning edge-transitive and "clean" (each white point has valence 2).

Related Riemann surfaces
The Klein quartic is related to various other Riemann surfaces.

Geometrically, it is the smallest Hurwitz surface (lowest genus); the next is the Macbeath surface (genus 7), and the following is the First Hurwitz triplet (3 surfaces of genus 14). More generally, it is the most symmetric surface of a given genus (being a Hurwitz surface); in this class, the Bolza surface is the most symmetric genus 2 surface, while Bring's surface is a highly symmetric genus 4 surface – see isometries of Riemann surfaces for further discussion.

Algebraically, the (affine) Klein quartic is the modular curve X(7) and the projective Klein quartic is its compactification, just as the dodecahedron (with a cusp in the center of each face) is the modular curve X(5); this explains the relevance for number theory.

More subtly, the (projective) Klein quartic is a Shimura curve (as are the Hurwitz surfaces of genus 7 and 14), and as such parametrizes principally polarized abelian varieties of dimension 6.

More exceptionally, the Klein quartic forms part of a "trinity" in the sense of Vladimir Arnold, which can also be described as a McKay correspondence. In this collection, the projective special linear groups PSL(2,5), PSL(2,7), and PSL(2,11) (orders 60, 168, 660) are analogous. Note that 4 × 5 × 6/2 = 60, 6 × 7 × 8/2 = 168, and 10 × 11 × 12/2 = 660. These correspond to icosahedral symmetry (genus 0), the symmetries of the Klein quartic (genus 3), and the buckyball surface (genus 70). These are further connected to many other exceptional phenomena, which is elaborated at "trinities".

Literature

 * Translated in.
 * . Paperback edition, Cambridge University Press, 2001, ISBN 978-0-521-00419-0. Reviewed by:
 * . Paperback edition, Cambridge University Press, 2001, ISBN 978-0-521-00419-0. Reviewed by:

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Klein quartic


text:
Youth For Understanding

Youth For Understanding (YFU) is an international educational exchange organization. A network of over 50 independent national organizations worldwide, YFU representatives work together to advance learning across cultures.

Each year, YFU exchanges approximately 4,500 students worldwide.

Organization
YFU conducts its exchange programs via direct contact between independent national organizations in over 50 countries. These autonomous organizations represent the international community network of YFU. Other YFU international activities are carried out by a volunteer International Advisory Council and a professional staff known as the International Secretariat. YFU organizations around the world subscribe to a set of basic operating and philosophic basic standards. The umbrella body for national Youth For Understanding organisations across Europe is EEE-YFU.

History of YFU
Youth for Understanding was founded by Rachel Andresen. In 1951 it was proposed to church leaders in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA that teenagers from Germany be brought to the United States to live with a family and attend high school for a year. As a result, 75 German teenagers arrived in Michigan in July 1951 and were hosted by volunteer U.S. families.

The exchange program itself originated in late summer 1951 by the High Commission in Germany as the "Urban/Rural Teen-Age Exchange Program". Already in its first year it was supported by members of the Michigan Council of Churches (MCC) under the motto "Youth for Understanding". Within the next 10 years it evolved into two organizations YFU-USA and YFU-Germany. The first "exchange" from the United States to Germany was a summer program with 30 US high school students organized by MCC-alumni. During that year, Germany became a sovereign country, and the US government stopped funding the exchange program with Germany, which continued as a not-for-profit activity between the two YFU organizations. In 1961/62, a one-year exchange program from the US to Germany was added with 6 initial students from the US. YFU Japan and YFU Mexico were established in 1958.

YFU, Inc., the non-profit educational organization, was established in 1964, and the organization's offices were moved to Rosedale in Washington, D.C. in 1978.

On March 8, 2002, YFU, Inc. ceased operations and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy later that year.

The YFU organization in United States was reorganized as YFU USA Inc., which opened on March 9, 2002. The organization's offices were moved to Bethesda, Maryland later in 2002. Ulrich Zahlten, founder and former chair of YFU Deutschland, became the new chairman of the board of YFU USA.

Organization
The guidelines for the work of the national YFU organizations will be decided by the International Advisory Council. The committee, which meets twice a year, consists of 15 representatives from national organizations. The national organisations from the United States, Germany and Japan as the largest members are constantly represented; the remaining sites are occupied in turn by other partners. The International Advisory Council is supported by the International Secretariat.

European Educational Exchanges – Youth for Understanding
European Educational Exchanges – Youth for Understanding (EEE-YFU) is an international youth exchange non-profit organisation, founded in 1985. It is the umbrella body for national Youth For Understanding organisations across Europe and consists of 28 members.

The mission of EEE-YFU is to advance intercultural understanding, mutual respect, and social responsibility through educational exchanges for youth, families, and communities.

YFU was founded shortly after the end of World War II, in 1951. It is one of the world's oldest education exchange organisations and currently has programmes in about 60 countries around the world. Founded to allow young Germans the opportunity to experience another culture outside of their own, YFU organised for them to go on exchange to the United States to see what life was like there and to develop an understanding of democracy. Since then YFU has grown and now sends young people between 15 and 18 years old on international high school exchanges to other countries, where the students will live with and become a part of a host family. National YFU organisations from around the world are all independent from one another. However, there does exist an International Secretariat to facilitate co-operation and communication amongst them on a global scale, and to provide them with support.

EEE-YFU is a member organisation, and its members are national YFU organisations in Europe. Unlike the national YFU organisations, it is not involved with the actual logistics and organising of the exchanges. Instead, it is a member organisation which focuses on representing the interests of its members in several different ways. In supporting its members, EEE-YFU has the following aims: to promote intercultural understanding through youth exchange programmes in Europe; to enhance the public visibility for Youth For Understanding in Europe and with European institutions and organisations; to enrich the experience of European exchange students by facilitating educational and content related activities; to facilitate co-operation and networking between member organisations and to provide membership services; to facilitate intra-European activities such as seminars, meetings and conferences on various topics; and to assist in planning and conducting international training for staff and volunteers.

The organisation has its offices in Brussels, Belgium, where it works towards representing its members' interests at European level and to facilitate co-ordination between its national members.

The EEE-YFU board has the ultimate responsibility for the overall strategic direction of the organisation, as well as the European Secretariat based in its office in Brussels. The Secretariat regularly has interns and volunteers (often from the European Voluntary Service programme) working in the office.

EEE-YFU is an international non-profit organisation under Belgian law (AISBL).

EEE-YFU works alongside a number of external organisations, and is regularly granted funding for projects and initiatives by European institutions and other bodies. Its partners include the Council of Europe Directorate of Youth & Sports, the European Commission, the European Youth Forum and the Platform for Intercultural Europe, as well as many others. It receives funding from the European Commission, the Council of Europe and the Belgian state, as well as other bodies. EEE-YFU also works closely with other NGOs involved in the youth field, particularly in relation to organising activities.

EEE-YFU works in three main areas: Capacity building; advocacy and representation; and knowledge building and networking.

The organisation fulfills its objectives by organising and facilitating educational activities to provide on-going education in cross-cultural issues to its students, returnees and volunteers. These help to promote intercultural dialogue and youth participation for a wide range of young people across Europe. EEE-YFU organises activities such as study sessions, trainings and seminars on various cultural and youth-related issues both nationally and on a European level. In doing so it often works closely with its member organisations. An important feature of EEE-YFU's activities is to encourage those students who have participated in exchanges to continue to be involved with YFU by volunteering once they return home. This will help to continue the cycle of learning and will allow YFU to reach out to more young people.

EEE-YFU has its own "European Trainer Network", composed of 13 young trainers from 10 different countries, which provides its member organisations with a pool of young people with relevant expertise and knowledge that they can use to organise and facilitate a range of events. This aims to help to increase the capacity for multiplication of competences and knowledge within the international YFU network, and for contributing to the development of training structures of national YFU organisations to provide high quality educational activities. EEE-YFU also has a "Pool of Representatives", composed of 33 young people from various member organisations. The members are an important tool for EEE-YFU's advocacy work, representing EEE-YFU on various seminars, working groups, meetings, conferences and other events.

The following YFU national organisations are members of EEE-YFU: Austria, Belgium (Flanders & Wallonia), Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Norway, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey.

title: Youth For Understanding


text:
Mars Surveyor '98

Mars Surveyor '98 was a mission in NASA's Mars Exploration Program that launched the Mars Climate Orbiter and the Mars Polar Lander to the planet Mars. The mission was to study the Martian weather, climate, water and carbon dioxide (CO2) budget, to understand the reservoirs, behavior, and atmospheric role of volatiles and to search for evidence of long-term and episodic climate changes. The Mars Polar Lander also carried two surface-penetrator probes for the New Millennium Program's Deep Space 2 mission. Both spacecraft were launched in 1998 and both were lost.

Orbiter
The orbiter was lost due to a miscalculation in trajectory caused by an unintended and undetected mismatch between metric and English units of measurement. The use of metric units as well as the data formats to employ were specified in a navigation software interface specification (SIS) published by JPL in 1996. Despite this, the flight operations team at Lockheed Martin provided impulse data in English units of pound-force seconds rather than newton seconds. These values were incorrect by a factor of 4.45 (1 lbf = 4.45 N). This caused erroneous course corrections that caused the orbiter to descend too low in Mars's atmosphere. The vehicle either burned up or bounced off into space.

Lander
Investigators concluded that the most likely cause of the lander's failure was a spurious sensor signal associated with the craft's legs falsely indicating the craft had touched down when in fact it was some 40 meters above the surface. When the landing legs unfolded they made a bouncing motion that accidentally set off the landing sensors, causing the descent engines to shut down prematurely and the lander to fall. Another possible reason for failure was inadequate preheating of catalysis beds for the pulsing rocket thrusters. Hydrazine fuel decomposes on the beds to make hot gases that are forced out of the rocket nozzles, generating thrust; in crash review tests cold catalysis beds caused misfiring and instability.

Mission
The Mars Surveyor 1998 program spacecraft development cost US$193.1 million. Launch costs for the Mars Surveyor '98 Program was estimated at US$91.7 million and mission operations at US$42.8 million. The Mars Climate Orbiter was part of NASA's 10-year Mars Surveyor Program, with launches every 26 months when the Earth and Mars are favorably positioned.

title: Mars Surveyor '98


text:
Talk:Uvular consonant

Given this:

 * The uvular trill [ʀ] is used in certain dialects (especially those associated with European capitals) of French, German, Dutch, Portuguese, Swedish and Norwegian, as well as Hebrew, for the rhotic phoneme.

this sentence is bullshit:

 * English, along with almost all languages of Europe and South-East Asia, has no uvular consonants. Uvulars are likewise completely unknown in indigenous languages of Australia and the Pacific.

Removing. 89.62.98.178 15:02, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

The unvoiced uvular fricative is also exceedingly rare. It sounds similar to the "kh" (represented in IPA as "x") in Spanish, German, Russian, or Arabic, except that it is articulated on the uvula. It can be heard in French at the end of a word following t, c, or p, as in maître: the R is here a voiceless uvular.

You serious?? Hebrew uses an unvoiced uvular fricative, as do most dialects of Spanish, many of German and Dutch, and plenty of languages in western North America.

 * Please fix the article then! -- Tarquin 21:23, 6 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * It's possible, I suppose, that the unvoiced uvular fricative might appear as a phone in the languages you mention. However, to my knowledge, the phoneme they all use is /x/, the unvoiced velar fricative - which is exactly what the article says. I've certainly never heard [χ] described as a phone in any variety of Spanish (and I would say I'm fairly familiar with Spanish phonetics) and in any case I can't imagine a situation where I might expect a velar /x/ to be realized as a uvular [χ]. The article's example of a voiced uvular fricative devoicing after an unvoiced stop seems much more logical. 129.2.211.72 18:29, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

 * There are kinds of Spanish where that phoneme is always pronounced [χ] and never [x]. So it doesn't make a lot of sense to call the phoneme "/x/". More importantly, articles like this are about phones, not about phonemes.
 * (I don't know Spanish. I don't know how standard [χ] is, or how pluricentric Standard Castilian is. I'm not sure if I've ever heard [x] in any kind of Spanish, though it probably occurs somewhere in America…)
 * All Hebrew I have heard (that is, on TV) has [χ] but never [x]. I think that also goes for Arabic, but I've heard very few Arabic so far…

 * It is easily possible that people write "/x/" out of sheer laziness when [χ] but not [x] occurs in a language, just like how it is tradition to transcribe any rhotic as "/r/" in languages that have only one rhotic, be it trill, approximant, fricative or even flap, alveolar, uvular or retroflex.

 * David Marjanović | david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at | 23:35 CEST | 2006/4/6

My edit
Because it's so late I'll be brief. I'll try to elaborate tomorrow.

Several examples come from the pages of the individual sounds. For example the Mam word for "fire" comes from Voiced uvular implosive; clicking on the link to Mam language on that page did not reveal any trace of an orthography, so I left that blank. The same goes for the Inuktitut example (the vowels of which look suspicious to me).

The information on Lakhota comes mostly from here (links to audio files).

The Quechua example comes from here (link to audio file). The rest of the information on Quechua comes from the Quechua article.

I'm a native speaker of southeastern German ( as short, often one-contact, in front of vowels and  elsewhere).

I've been to France for months, and that's the source for what I wrote about French. However, if you go here and click on the picture, you'll see a 12-minute movie with one-contact trills all over the place and fricatives in front of consonants; one guy seems to use fricatives only(*), but he doesn't get to say much. (BTW, I know a Canadian who always uses and never any fricative, so the previous version which said "non-Parisian French" generally prefers fricatives was quite misleading.)

The information on Spanish comes from hearing native speakers and advanced learners. I'm sure j is realized as [x] somewhere, but even though it's described as [x] all over Wikipedia, all Castilian I've heard or been told about has an unambiguous [χ] instead, like the Swiss German dialects. (In Latin America this doesn't seem to occur.) Strictly speaking that's original research, but there must be citable literature about this somewhere.

The transcription of one-contact trills with the IPA extra-short diacritic is my ad-hoc invention. Traditionally the Spanish one-contact trill (phonemically distinct from a very long trill) is transcribed as, but this is IMHO totally misleading because the English flap is a totally different sound.

(*) Wikipedia used to be full of claims that the voiced uvular fricative were the standard rhotic in French and even German before I started changing them. I wonder if native English speakers have difficulties recognizing one-contact trills as trills and, if they are linguists, interpret them as approximants or fricatives.

Good night then.

David Marjanović | david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at | 01:17 CEST | 2006/4/9

 * Hi David,
 * A couple problems. AFAIK, Inuit  is a voiced uvular fricative, though I don't know about dialectical variation. You also should not get pG clusters in Inuktitut, which makes the example even more doubtful. (The vowels, BTW, are fine. Uvulars commonly lower high vowels.)
 * I would change 'Standard German' to 'Austrian German'.
 * I wouldn't use Mishnaic Hebrew. A reconstructed pronunciation is just asking for trouble.
 * I'll remove your O.R. short sign on the trills. As I've said before, one-contact trills are normal, and the only time they're distinctive is when there's gemination.
 * And no, no one has difficulty recognizing trills. Usually people base their analyses on waveforms anyway, so it wouldn't matter if they couldn't hear them. The only problem would be if the sound itself were ambiguous, which in very possibly is in French and German. The reason the same symbol is used for the English and Spanish flaps is that no language contrasts these sounds. If you wish to do so, you can use for Spanish and D for English.

kwami 23:45, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

 * Hi!
 * I have next to no idea about Inuktitut. I just copied the example from the voiced uvular plosive page (and added the ). If you know better, please do "be bold". Thanks for explaining the vowels!

 * I've just found a real example here and put it in.
 * David Marjanović | david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at | 21:48 CEST | 2006/4/11

 * I really think "Standard German" should stay. I have heard Germans use uvular or velar fricatives for , but only in front of consonants (which is either a hypercorrectivism or a dialectal influence somewhere along the Rhine). I hear Germans speak on TV more or less every day.
 * Mishnaic Hebrew was already there; it was one of the two examples that the page had. I agree it should be changed, but I didn't notice… I'll exchange the example for "Qazaq".
 * Some people seem to insist that a one-contact trill must not be called "trill" but "tap" – if there aren't at least two contacts, the onomatopoi...etic description "trill" doesn't fit, it's more like a plosive. As for what it sounds like, do you have Skype? :-)
 * In examples like these, which are about phones rather than phonemes, a narrow phonetic transcription makes a lot more sense than a phonemic one. That's why I transcribed the /p/ (unaspirated pulmonic bilabial plosive) of Lakhota with two diacritics, and that's is why I make such contortions to avoid the ambiguous . (I don't quite dare use D ; it's not recognized by the IPA.)
 * BTW, if I used in a phonetic transcription of Spanish , Spanish  would have to be . :o)
 * David Marjanović | david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at | 00:30 CEST | 2006/4/11

 * Just changed Mishnaic Hebrew to Kazakh. Problem: I have no idea where the stress goes, and the Kazakh language article doesn't tell.
 * David Marjanović | david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at | 00:55 CEST | 2006/4/11

 * Got rid of the Spanish problem now by choosing another word. This has the additional benefit of having j in front of a back vowel, the position where actual [χ] is most common according to Talk:Spanish_phonology.
 * David Marjanović | david.marjanovic_at_gmx.at | 18:26 CEST | 2006/5/14

"Uvular"
The article starts like this:

Uvulars are consonants articulated with the back of the tongue against or near the uvula, that is, further back in the mouth than velar consonants.

The term uvular is used only from lack of a better term. The phonemes are actually made against the soft palate, no? Way in the back, yes? So a better way to do that sentence might be:

Uvulars are consonants articulated with the back of the tongue against or near the very back of the soft palate, where the uvula hangs from; further back in the mouth than velar consonants.

Or something like that. Because there's no way you can make sound off that little lobe of flesh in the back of your mouth. This would be a very good change.

–Misha

 * French and German speakers would find this a very strange definition: the uvular trill /R/ most certainly involves the uvula... how can the back of the velum possibly produce a trill? JREL (talk) 05:14, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

 * You've just chosen the only uvular consonant where a big fat uvula might actually help...the rest of the time it's probably pretty useless...no muscles, no hardness, just flopping around during "uvular" plosives and fricatives, I'm sure...

 * I'm not arguing that the term uvular should be replaced...just thought I should mention that...I just feel that the term was probably invented to mean "further back than velar" and not "with the hanging lobe"...

 * It's only a feeling...meditate on it...

 * -Misha

 * I bet the uvula gives uvular fricatives their distinctive sound. I also don't see why the uvula can't participate in the uvular stops. However, you're right that is different from the others: the others are made with the dorsum, the part of the tongue that's used to make velar consonants, while  is not. David Marjanović 21:24, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

improvement to the en.wikipedia version of this article?
A direct link to a wave file might be beneficial in the beginning of this article for English speakers who have no inherent capability of understanding what this might sound like because of the limitations of their chosen written language. I am curious about these, specifically because of what part of the tongue they are made with, but because I suffer this language limitation myself I am unable to make a recommendation as to which link would be the best..

 * I second that wholeheartedly. All the phonetics articles would be greatly improved by .ogg files of native speakers making the sounds described in the articles. They would also be improved by jargon-free descriptions of the precise articulatory gestures -- the movements of the tongue. — Solo Owl (talk) 12:04, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

 * The individual pages (voiceless uvular plosive) have pronunciations in the opening table, except a few of the truly exotic sounds. A quick description of how you would at least get close to a uvular would simply be to take the 'k' sound in English and make it farther back in the mouth.  As for jargon-free pronunciation guides, I'm not sure Wikipedia is the place for them, but between the sampled pronunciations, the table that lists if a sound is found in English, place of articulation and manner of articulation (especially the individual pages of those two), they provide pretty much all the information you need to pronounce them.  And if just can't figure one out, ask at the language reference desk.  Vowels... well, they're tougher.  Lsfreak (talk) 00:32, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Question
Curiosity always strike me. Can you pronounce uvular consonants when you remove your uvula? Komitsuki (talk) 09:38, 10 February 2012 (UTC)
 * This type of question might be a bit more appropriate for the Language_reference_desk (if nothing else, you'll get an answer faster). Except for the uvular trill, none of the uvular consonants actually use the uvula as a necessary part of sound production.  My gut feeling, though, is that someone who spoke a language that had both velar and uvular fricatives could potentially confuse people as to which they were using, as (from the perspective of someone whose native language has neither) the wobble the uvula makes in rapid speech does seem to give the latter a very distinctive sound compared to the former. Lsfreak (talk) 20:41, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Piaf

 * French (20th century Paris accent, e.g. by Édith Piaf)

A distinctive feature of Piaf's pronunciation (at least in singing) is that she did not use the standard uvular trill; she sang with an alveolar trill instead. I'll remove her. —Tamfang (talk) 19:28, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

قصة in Arabic have another pronunciation
in Arabic language you can Pronunce this word As next Qisah' Qisatun Qisatan Qisaten Please add this in article for somebody who are learning arbic to know more احمد هاني 1 (talk) 07:44, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Uvular consonant


text:
Melwin Cedeño

Melwin Cedeño (born December 27, 1964) is a Puerto Rican actor, comedian, host, and dancer. Cedeño is better known for his comedic performance as Chevy.

Early years and studies
Melwin Cedeño was raised in Santa Isabel, Puerto Rico. His parents are Noel Cedeño and Lilina Irizarry. During childhood, he enjoyed making people laugh and admitted he was frequently "kicked out of school for making jokes in the classroom". Cedeño began to pursue pre-med studies at the Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico in Ponce. However, he dropped out, and moved to study Drama at the University of Puerto Rico in Rio Piedras.

Career
While studying, Cedeño joined a local merengue orchestra called Los Nenes de Puerto Rico. His partners in the orchestra later became members of the popular group Límite 21. He also joined the university theatre group working in several plays like La Celestina and Bodas de Sangre. Cedeño also debuted in television shows in dramatic roles in soap operas such as Alejandra, Karina Montaner, and Apartamento de Solteras. He achieved recognition for his dramatic role as a young drug addict in the telenovela Andrea.

At the end of the 1980s, Cedeño started working as a comedian in popular shows like Show del Mediodía and El Kiosko Budweiser. It was during this time that his character of Chevy was born. According to him, he had played a Nuyorican character in the play Tres hombres y un bébe, which prompted actress Yasmín Mejías to invite him to participate in one segment of a Luisito Vigoreaux show called Cafetería la 15. "They were looking for a 'son' for the character of Georgina Borri ... Luis didn't want me to play 'Chevy', but one day he wasn't at work, I put on the glasses and the handkerchief... the place was about to fall down."

The popularity of the character spawned a daily show titled Con Lo Que Cuenta Este País, which debuted in 1991. It was broadcast by Telemundo Puerto Rico and produced by Hector Marcano. The show remained among the top shows in audience ratings for several years until its cancelation in 1993.

After that, Cedeño hosted the comedy game show Alto Voltaje, also produced by Marcano in Telemundo, but the show was canceled after just three months. After the end of the series, Cedeño decided to retire briefly from public life. He moved to the United States exploring offers from Telemundo and Univision. Eventually, he returned to Puerto Rico and continued working in theater and with brief comedic appearances in shows like Eso Vale.

In the late 1990s, Cedeño made a film titled Chevy... Episodio I, along with producer Gabriel Suau, marked the come-back of his popular character. As a result of the response to the film, Cedeño received an offer to host a new show for kids titled Pégate con Chevy. The show debuted in 2000, and received the acknowledgment of Puerto Rican children's audiences. However, in 2002, the show was canceled despite its favorable reviews.

Cedeño still works regularly in television and theatre, and his character of Chevy remains popular among Puerto Ricans. He is currently a co-host in the show Pégate al Mediodía, along with Angelique Burgos, Jaime Mayol, and Natalia Rivera. Cedeño was initially brought in as a guest host but was made permanent when Mayol left to work on another show.

Personal life
Melwin is currently married to former model and actress Phaedra Michalzik. They have two children together: Xander and Ackerly. Melwin has an adult son, Melwin Ahmed, from a previous relationship.

title: Melwin Cedeño


text:
YFU

YFU may refer to:
 * Youth For Understanding, a non-profit organisation
 * A US Navy hull classification symbol: Harbor utility craft (YFU)

title: YFU


text:
Planchet

A planchet is a round metal disk that is ready to be struck as a coin. An older word for planchet is flan. They are also referred to as blanks.

History
The preparation of the flan or planchet has varied over the years. In ancient times, the flan was heated before striking because the metal that the coin dies were made of was not as hard as dies today, and the dies would have worn faster and broken sooner had the flan not been heated to a high temperature to soften it.

An unusual method was used to mint the one-sided, bowl-shaped pfennigs of the Holy Roman Empire. The planchet used for these so-called Schüsselpfennigs was larger than the coin die itself. The coins were made by striking with only one upper die on the larger planchet. As a result, the perimeter of the planchet was pressed upwards in the shape of a bowl or plate. Until the 18th century they were minted mainly in the Harz Mountains. The curved shape of the pfennig was very useful for handling small change because it was easier to grip than a flat coin.

Modern striking
Today's dies are made from hardened steel, and the presses use many thousands of pounds of force to strike coins (varying according to the size of the coin and the complexity and relief of the design). In addition, today's coins have much lower relief than ancient coins. Because of this, the planchet no longer needs to be heated immediately before striking, although it is annealed by heating and slow cooling which softens the coin.

Preparation
Preparation of the modern planchet involves several steps. First, the metal (or metals in the case of clad or multilayered coins) is rolled out into a large roll or sheet of the correct thickness. This process is often done by third parties, not by the mint itself. These flat rolls or sheets of metal are then punched out into round blanks that are a little larger than the coin being struck. The blanks are then subjected to an annealing process that softens the metal through heating to approximately 750 degrees Celsius (1400 degrees Fahrenheit) and are then slowly air cooled. They are then washed to remove residue from the annealing process and dried.

Completion
Finally, the planchet is struck. After striking, it becomes a coin and is no longer a planchet. Occasionally, a planchet will escape the mint without having been struck. This is a blank planchet error, and is usually worth a few dollars for modern coins. Occasionally, blank planchets can be rare and valuable, such is the case for Morgan Dollar blank planchets, although authentication and appraisal by a coin grading service is highly recommended for such pieces as they would be fairly easy to counterfeit.

title: Planchet


text:
User talk:Rmdelatorre

Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia. Here are some useful links in case you haven't already found them; *How to edit a page *How to write a great article *Naming conventions *Manual of Style If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my talk page. I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Alexandros 20:59, 6 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Hi, you might want to integrate the stuff at Lorem ipsum into the new Lorem Ipsum page you created (or redirect the new one to the old one, or whatever), so there won't be a duplicate page :) Adam Bishop 21:55, 6 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I have listed Lorem Ipsum on Possible copyright infringements, because it appears to be copied from Lorem Ipsum - All the facts - Lipsum generator. If you have any questions ask me on my talk page or ask on Talk:Lorem Ipsum. Noldoaran 22:33, Dec 6, 2003 (UTC)

title: User talk:Rmdelatorre