Aggrey Zola Klaaste OMSG (6 January 1940 – 19 June 2004) was a South African newspaper journalist and editor. He was best known for being editor of the Soweto-based newspaper, the Sowetan, from 1988 to 2002. He introduced the concept of "nation building" while editor of the Sowetan and spent much of his time and energy promoting the idea.

Early life

Klaaste was born in Kimberley as one of eight children, in a township called Green Point in the Northern Cape. His father Tobias Klaaste was born in 1886 and died in 1973. His mother Regina Mantoa was born in 1900 and died in 1986. Klaaste attended WITS with South African literary luminaries like Miriam Tlali, the first black woman in South Africa to publish a novel in English.

Career

After graduating he became a journalist, first with Drum magazine and subsequently with The World (which was banned by the South African government in 1977) and The Post (which became the Sowetan in 1981). While working as an intern for Drum magazine, whose celebrated writers had by this time moved on to different things, Klaaste's lifestyle emulated that of his predecessors. He soon battled with alcoholism. In 1961 he took on a permanent job as a writer for Bantu World. Due to heavy drinking, he struggled to hold on to permanent work for too long. He found himself back at Drum in 1964, where he covered the famous Rivonia Trial. With these two factors to consider, Klaaste decided to shift the newspaper's editorial policy and began sparking a dialogue around nation building. He wrote at length in his column On the Line about a non-racial South Africa and practical measures with which black people can make sense of apartheid on a daily basis. Klaaste was also known to be an active member of his community in Meadowlands, Soweto. Klaaste faced more criticism for his attempts at unifying a divided country, particularly from the Black Consciousness Movement, who accused him of ‘selling-out’ by spreading ideas of a non-racial society.

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  • KLAASTE, Aggrey Zola International Who's Who. accessed September 4, 2006.