NELSON MANDELA & F.W. DE KLERK

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- DE KLERK: In prison, Mr. Mandela, probably had a perception of leaders of the National Party that was proved wrong when he met us. My first meeting with him in 1989 was fairly relaxed. We came to grips with some fundamental things, basically the need to solve the problem of South Africa through negotiation and recognizing each other as main players who would have to take the lead. MANDELA: I found Mr. De Klerk very positive, very bright, very confident of himself, and ready to accommodate the views I expressed. The National Party had announced a ((reform)) program in which they talked about ''group rights.'' I said to him, ''Look, this will introduce apartheid through the back door.'' He replied, ''Well, if you don't like it, then we'll scrap it.'' I smuggled a message to the A.N.C. leadership in Zambia and said, ''I think we can do business with this man.'' I did not expect that he was going to be so positive. DE KLERK: I don't believe I am irreplaceable. I don't believe he is irreplaceable. The fact is we were around, and we were the leaders. MANDELA: I was disappointed by him because he did things that I did not expect. Such as the question of violence. I said to him that if there is anything that will create bad blood between us, it is the slaughter of human beings with government connivance. That is the one thing that has created a great deal of friction between me and De Klerk. DE KLERK: A different approach from the A.N.C. could have prevented much of the grief. Mandela could have started negotiating sooner. They should never have embarked on acts of terrorism, killing innocent civilians; it had a dramatic effect on white public opinion. If they had refrained, we might not have had the state of emergency we had. Sanctions were quite counterproductive. They built a strong sense of nationalism: We will not allow the world to tell us what to do! MANDELA: In spite of my criticism, it must be acknowledged he has made a very important contribution to the transformation of an apartheid state to a nonracial society. MANDELA: When I was sent to jail, my mother got a terrible shock. She had never been to school, and valued education. She had in mind a dignified profession for me. I had to sit down and explain to her why I was in the A.N.C. She became so convinced that later she said to me, ''If you don't join other children and fight for our liberation, I am going to disinherit you.'' DE KLERK: My brother was a very liberal editor of a daily newspaper. He was criticizing us, he was urging us to do what we are doing now. My father ((a Cabinet minister in three apartheid governments)) would agree with me today; he died in 1979. I had discussions with him; at dinner, invariably, before we reached the sweets we got on to politics. He was a man who always looked for justice. He asked himself, If a plan cannot work, then it becomes immoral to continue something you acknowledge in your own conscience cannot work. MANDELA: Chief Albert Luthuli ((A.N.C. president, 1952 to '67)) believed in nonviolence as a way of life. But we who were in touch with the grass roots persuaded the chief that if we did not begin the armed struggle, then people would proceed without guidance. Armed struggle must be a movement intended to hit at the symbols of oppression and not to slaughter human beings. DE KLERK: Our cherished ideal was self-determination. Grand apartheid was the concept of ''separate development,'' bringing full political rights to the