Former president, Mr F. W. de Klerk, yesterday bid farewell to his murdered ex-wife Marike at a memorial service before warning that South Africa was being severely damaged by its appallingly high murder rate of more than 21,000 a year.
Mr de Klerk, who was married to Marike for 39 years before the break-up of their marriage in 1998, was the chief mourner, together with his son, Willem, at a memorial service in Cape Town's Gereformeerde Kerk.
His voice choked with emotion as, watched by representatives of all South Africa's main political parties, he read a tribute to the slain woman from their three children
"Thank you for Mom's love . . . may God give her peace . . . To the person or persons responsible for her death, we say that vengeance is not ours," he said.
Mrs de Klerk, who was murdered at her luxury apartment in Cape Town by an intruder on Monday, will be buried in Pretoria today following a funeral service at the Wapadrand Gereformeerde Kerk.
After yesterday's memorial service, Mr de Klerk told journalists: "We, as a country, are being damaged by every murder. No murder is more serious than the other. The one on my former wife, Marike, however, sends out a very negative message across the world."
The memorial service took place after Western Cape Provincial Commissioner Lennit Max confirmed press reports that a 21-year-old security guard - who worked at the complex where Mrs de Klerk lived - had confessed to the killing.
He was detained for questioning on Thursday before being taken, in leg irons and handcuffs, before Cape Town Magistrate Hennie Le Roux, before whom he is said to have made the confession.
"The suspect was identified through clues gathered by the investigators, of which one was a call made from the victim's cellular phone," Commissioner Max said.
The suspected killer allegedly used the phone to contact his employers, a local security company, asking to be booked off sick.