A former leader of a black tribal homeland that was one of the so-called Bantustans that helped to underpin South Africa's apartheid system has died, local media reported on Friday.
Lucas Mangope, 94, was president of Bophuthatswana until democracy in 1994 after which the 10 small apartheid-created states were dismantled and South Africa's first democratic president Nelson Mandela described him as a "forgotten man". "Mangope was among the African personalities... that sustained the apartheid social engineering of ethnic division," the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party said in a statement.
Mangope was installed by South Africa's apartheid government to administer the semi-autonomous tribal territory, which was scattered across a number of enclaves within the northwest region of the then white-ruled nation. He became president of the homeland in 1977.
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