Horst Kleinschmidt

Horst Kleinschmidt is an anti-apartheid and human rights activist. He was Vice President of the National Union of South African Students (1969) and Assistant to Ds. Beyers Naude of the South African Christian Institute (1975). He was detained and charged under various apartheid laws and eventually forced into exile. In exile he was Director of the International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa (1982 – 1992) providing legal aid to opponents of minority rule in Southern Africa and worked with the ANC internal underground structures. After returning to South Africa  in 1992 he worked for human rights and development organisations. He was the head of the Government Fisheries programme (2000 – 2005) to affect transformation in the allocation of fishing quotas from white beneficiaries to a non-racial system of allocations. Now in his retirement he continues to be an activist and writer on matters concerning inequality and restitution.