At the age of four, he was struck by meningitis in Lourenço Marques (modern-day Maputo, Mozambique); he received treatment at a small hospital in Barberton, Transvaal, and his mother vowed that if he survived, he would become a church minister.

[6] In his first year studying law at the University of Pretoria, a theologian explained to him that God would not expect him to keep his mother's promise to become a church minister.

[6] In 1966, Botha was appointed legal adviser at the Department of Foreign Affairs, in which capacity he served on the delegation representing South Africa at the United Nations from 1967 to 1977.

[6] In 1974, he was appointed South Africa's permanent representative to the United Nations[6] and presented his credentials to Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim on 15 October 1974;[9] in November of that year, however, South Africa was suspended from membership of the General Assembly and, over the ensuing years, the country was excluded from official participation in virtually all of the UN's organs and agencies.

[13] The next year, he stated publicly (during a press conference in Parliament, asked by German journalist Thomas Knemeyer) that it would be possible for South Africa to be ruled by a black president provided that there were guarantees for minority rights, but was quickly forced to acknowledge that this position did not reflect government policy.

On 13 December 1988, Botha and Defence Minister Magnus Malan ratified the Brazzaville Protocol, which led to the effective cessation of hostilities in that conflict.

[17] On 21 December 1988, Botha, with a 22-strong South African delegation from Johannesburg, was initially booked to travel to the Namibian independence ratification ceremony in New York on Pan Am Flight 103 from London.

[18] Botha subsequently served as Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs in South Africa's first post-apartheid government from 1994 to 1996 under President Nelson Mandela.

He said he'd realized that apartheid was morally wrong in the 1970s, but didn't do enough to "turn the tide" against the regime and prevent atrocities from being committed, which he blamed on South African security forces.

[23] On 12 December 2013, Botha appeared on the BBC's Question Time, hosted in Johannesburg, discussing the life and legacy of Nelson Mandela.