page_title: Marais Viljoen
section_title: Early life
hierarchical_section_title: Marais Viljoen / Early life
caption_attribution_description: English: Marais Viljoen in Velsen (The Netherlands), 9 Jan. 1975
context_page_description: Marais Viljoen, DMS was the last ceremonial State President of South Africa from 4 June 1979 until 3 September 1984. Viljoen became the last of the ceremonial presidents of South Africa when he was succeeded in 1984 by Prime Minister P. W. Botha, who combined the offices into an executive presidency.
context_section_description: Viljoen was the youngest of six children of Magdalena Debora "Lenie" (de Villiers) and Gabriel Francois Viljoen. He was married on 20 April 1940 to Dorothea Maria Brink (17 September 1917 – 5 October 2005), with whom he had one daughter Elizabeth Magdalena (Elna) Viljoen.
  After finishing school at Jan van Riebeeck High School in Cape Town, he went to work in the Post Office, and thereafter at the Afrikaans language newspaper, Die Transvaler, edited by Hendrik Verwoerd, who later became Prime Minister.
caption: Viljoen in the Netherlands, 1975
exif: {}