Max du Preez is one of South Africa's foremost journalists and political analysts. After working as a political correspondent for various newspapers, he founded Vrye Weekblad, South Africa's first anti-apartheid Afrikaans newspaper, in 1988, and after 1994 he launched the television programmes Special Report on the Truth Commission and Special Assignment. His books include Pale Native, Dwars, Of Lovers, Warriors and Prophets, Oranje Blanje Blues, Of Tricksters, Tyrants and Turncoats and Oor Krygers, Korrelkoppe en Konkelaars. He is currently a syndicated political columnist, public speaker and documentary filmmaker.
Among his awards are the Pringle Award from the South African Society of Journalists, the Louis M Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism from the Nieman Fellows at Harvard University, and the Excellence in Journalism award from the Southern African Foreign Correspondents Association. He was the 2006 Yale Globalist International Journalist of the Year and the 2008 recipient of the Nat Nakasa Award for Integrity and Courage in Journalism from the SA National Editors Forum. He is a fellow of the Centre for Leadership Ethics in Africa at the University of Fort Hare and extraordinary professor at the School of Communications at North-West University.