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THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

For Immediate Release June 7, 1999

                          PRESIDENT CLINTON 
            NAMES DELANO E. LEWIS FOR U.S. AMBASSADOR 
                  TO THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA

The President today announced his intent to nominate Delano E. Lewis to be U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of South Africa.

Mr. Delano E. Lewis, of Las Cruces, New Mexico, served from 1994 to 1998 as President and CEO of National Public Radio (NPR), the primary supplier of news, information, and cultural programming to over 500 member and associate stations throughout the nation. Prior to joining NPR, he was President and CEO of C&P Telephone of Washington, DC, a company he served for twenty-one years.

Mr. Lewis began his career in government in 1963 as an attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice and later joined the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. From 1966 to 1969, he served in the U.S. Peace Corps as Associate Director in Nigeria and as Country Director in Uganda. Upon his return from Africa, he was named Director of the Peace Corps' East and Southern Africa Division. He continued his public service on Capitol Hill as Legislative Assistant to Senator Edward Brooke of Massachusetts and later as Administrative Assistant to Delegate Walter E. Fauntroy of the District of Columbia.

Mr. Lewis has been active in numerous civic, cultural, and business activities and currently serves on the boards of Colgate-Palmolive, Black Entertainment Television, Halliburton Company, the Eastman Kodak Company, and Africare. He was selected "Man of the Year" by the Greater Washington Board of Trade in 1992 and received the Distinguished Leadership Award and Media Spotlight Award from Amnesty International in 1997.

Mr. Lewis was born in Arkansas City, Kansas. He earned a BA from the University of Kansas and a JD from the Washburn University School of Law in Topeka, Kansas. He is married to Gayle Carolyn Jones Lewis, and they have four children.

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