Sheila Camerer

Infobox Politician
name = Sheila Margaret Camerer


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office = Member of Parliament
term_start = 2004
term_end =
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successor =
constituency =
majority =
office2 =Member of Parliament
term_start2 = 1994
term_end2 = 2003
predecessor2 =
successor2 =
constituency2 =
majority2 =
office3 =Member of Parliament
term_start3 = 1987
term_end3 = 1994
predecessor3 =
successor3 =
constituency3 = Rosetenville
majority3 =
birth_date = Birth date and age|1941|12|15|mf=y
birth_place = Cape Town, South Africa
death_date =
death_place =
party =2003-present Democratic Alliance
1997-2003 New National Party
1982-1997 National Party
relations =
spouse = Alexander Camerer
civil partner =
children =1 son, 2 daughters
residence =
occupation =
religion =


website =
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Sheila Margaret Camerer is a South African politician and senior Member of Parliament of the main opposition Democratic Alliance(DA).

Although Camerer's father, Robert Badenhorst-Durandt had been a Member of Parliament for the ruling National Party (NP), as a young lawyer in the mid-1970s she worked on the legal defence strategies of anti-apartheid activitists, including that of the Soweto Committee of Ten. The latter included Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, wife of then jailed African National Congress (ANC) leader and future South African President, Nelson Mandela.

Camerer shocked the establishment when she joined the NP herself and in 1982 was elected NP member of the Johannesburg City Council. In 1987 she was elected Member of Parliament for the Johannesburg constituency of Rosettenville and two years later appointed deputy justice minister in the government of reformist NP leader and South African president FW de Klerk.

During the constitutional negotiations on a democratic South Africa, Camerer was employed to lead the NP in drafting a Bill of Rights. Later she became a prominent spokesperson for the party in parliament, and served shortly as deputy justice minister after 1994 until De Klerk decided to suspend the party's participation in the Government of National Unity (GNU). In 1997, she became leader of the NP in the National Assembly, the first-ever woman and English-speaker in the party's history to hold the post. [http://www.dispatch.co.za/1997/09/19/page%204.htm]

Camerer was seen as opposing the withdrawal of the now remained New National Party (NNP) from the Democratic Alliance (DA) in 2001, but remained an NNP member until 2003 when newly promulgated legislation allowed her to defect to the DA without losing her parliamentary seat.

In November 2006 Camerer voted in favour of legislation permitting homosexual civil unions.

References

External links

* [http://www.thoughtleader.co.za/sheilacamerer Camerer's Blog]
* [http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=79&art_id=arch87293be74f7ee084e Camerer's dilemma over validity of death penalty]
* [http://152.111.1.251/argief/berigte/dieburger/2006/11/16/SK/2/polgcjwg.html Wet ‘is stap op pad na gelykheid’]
* [http://www.whoswhosa.co.za/Pages/profilefull.aspx?IndID=4597 Who's who- Sheila Camerer]