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TheVolksparty (VP) (People's Party) was a short-livedSouth Africanpolitical party from 1939 to 1941.

In 1934 the coalition government of theNational Party underJ.B.M. Hertzog and theSouth African Party underJan Smuts merged to form theUnited Party, which won 111 of the 150 seats in theSouth African general election, 1938 with Hertzog as prime minister. Dissident National Party members formed theGesuiwerde Nasionale Party underD.F. Malan.

When the United Kingdom declared war on Germany in 1939, Hertzog proposed to his party and parliament that South Africa remain neutral. This was defeated and Hertzog left the government to be replaced by Smuts with South Africa joining theAllies. Following the rupture of theUnited Party, Hertzog and his supporters negotiated with theGesuiwerde Nasionale Party in an attempt to reunify the Afrikaner parties. Initially, the differences between the more moderate Hertzog group andGesuiwerde Nasionale Party seemed insurmountable and so the Volksparty was formed withBen Schoeman elected as the chairman of the party on 9 December 1939.^[1]

After difficult negotiations with Malan, the joint opposition called itselfGesuiwerde Nasionale Party of Volksparty (Purified National Party or People's Party) nominally under Hertzog's leadership from January 1940. But further disagreements led to another split in 1941 with Hertzog andNicolaas Havenga forming theAfrikaner Party and Malan theHerenigde Nasionale Party (Re-united National Party). These two parties together won theSouth African general election, 1948, and then merged calling themselves theNational Party again.^[2]

• Afrikaner organizations
• Defunct political parties in South Africa
• Political parties established in 1939
• 1939 establishments in South Africa
• Political parties disestablished in 1941

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from April 2022