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History glossary

National Party

the South African party that won power in 1948 and made apartheid official policy.

Category
Political party
Region
South Africa
Date range
1914-1997

What it means

The National Party was an Afrikaner nationalist party that won South Africa's white-only election in 1948. Under D. F. Malan and later leaders, it turned segregation into the more systematic state programme known as apartheid.

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