Minister of Finance of the Republic of South Africa since 4 April 1996.
Member of National Executive Committee (NEC) of the African National Congress (ANC) since 1991.
Member of Parliament since 1994.
Member of National Working Committee.
Academic Qualifications
Matriculated from Harold Cressy High School, Cape Town.
National Diploma in Civil and Structural Engineering, from the Peninsula Technikon.
Executive Management Programme from Stanford National University, Singapore.
Career/Positions/Memberships/Other Activities
Part of a youth movement who attempted to launch a bus boycott across all townships of the Western Cape (1975).
Initiated community newsletter entitled "Kenfacs" in the townships of Kensington/Factreton, the newsletter was used as a basis for community organisation around a series of civic issues (1979).
Part of a group who initiated the first community newspaper of scale, Grassroots (1980).
Active in bringing together a number of Parents Supporting Committeee which were formed to generate community support for school boycotts.
General Secretary of the Cape Areas Housing Action Committee (1981).
Regional Secretary and National Executive Member of the United Democratic Front (UDF) (1983).
Repeatedly detained without trial or placed under house arrest, spending a total of 35 months in detention for these activities (1985 - February 1990).
Employed with the Mobil Foundation as a Policy Manager on Entrepreneurial and Community Development (May 1989).
Elected to full-time office in the ANC (August 1991).
Appointed as Head of the ANC's Department of Economic Planning (1991).
Responsible for the shaping of ANC's economic policy in this capacity (1991 - May 1994).
Appointed to the Advisory Committee of the United Nations (UN) Initiative for Trade Efficiency (August 1994).
Minister of Trade and Industry of the Republic of South Africa (1994 - 3 April 1996).
Governor on the Board of the World Bank, African Development Bank Group and Development Bank of Southern Africa.
Chairman of the South African Development Community Finance and Investment Sector.
Chairman of the Board of Governors of the International Monetary Fund at Annual meetings in Prague in September 2000.
Served as Special Envoy to the Secretary-General, UN for the Conference on Financing for Development, held in Monterrey, Mexico from 18-20 March 2002.
Chairperson of the Development Committee, International Monetary Fund (IMF) since April 2002.
Appointed as a Commissioner in the Commission for Africa.
Initiated a programme of support for SMME's for South Afrca's accession in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and initiated South Africa's entry in to the global economy.
Serves on the Commission on Growth and Development as a Commissioner.
Appointed Special Envoy for development finance by the United Nations Secretary General Mr. Ban ki-moon.
Awards/Decorations/Presentations/Bursaries
Elected by the World Economic Forum as a Global Leader for Tomorrow (January 1994).
Awarded the Africa Prize by the German Africa Foundation, jointly with the then South African Minister of Finance, Derek Keys (September 1994).
Named Euromoney's African Finance Minister of the year (1997).
Inducted as a member of South African Academy of Engineering (February 2001).
Honorary Doctorate of Commerce from University of Stellenbosch (December 2001).
Honorary Doctorate of Commerce from University of the Western Cape (13 March 2002).
Honorary Doctorate of Technology from Technikon South Africa (15 November 2002).
Honorary Doctorate of Technology from Peninsula Technikon (16 March 2002).
Honorary Doctorate of Economics from University of Natal (02 April 2003).
Honorary Doctorate of Technology from Free State Technikon (2003).
Honorary Doctorate of Law from Rhodes University (2006).
Presidential award by the Institute of Personnel Management (IPM), Johannesburg (2 October 2006).
Management Excellence Award (MANEX) by Wits Business School (5 October 2006).
Awarded Johannesburg Press Association Newsmaker of the year for 2005.
Appointed Chancellor of the Cape Town University of Technology (1 June 2008).
