F.w. De Klerk

Former US president Barack Obama will deliver a speech to a crowd of 15,000 people in South Africa on Tuesday as the centrepiece of celebrations marking 100 years since Nelson Mandela's birth.

As a reporter, I covered two of the greatest losers of the last century. The superlative "greatest" applies both to the scale of the loss -- Mikhail Gorbachev lost Russia and all of its colonies, F. W. de Klerk lost the richest country in Africa -- and to the manner in which they lost it. Our hearts understandably thrill to the courage of those who...

Former US president Barack Obama will deliver a speech to a crowd of 15,000 people in South Africa on Tuesday as the centrepiece of celebrations marking 100 years since Nelson Mandela's birth.

As a reporter, I covered two of the greatest losers of the last century. The superlative "greatest" applies both to the scale of the loss -- Mikhail Gorbachev lost Russia and all of its colonies, F. W. de Klerk lost the richest country in Africa -- and to the manner in which they lost it. Our hearts understandably thrill to the courage of those who...