A Johannesburg businessman bought former president PW Botha's Wilderness home for R3.6-million, the SABC reported on Saturday.

Amabhubezi Investment Company chairperson Sango Ntsaluba put in the final bid for "De Anker" situated on the banks of the Touws River in the Southern Cape.

Ntsabula told SABC it would have been disheartening if a foreigner had bought the property.

He said the fact that a black person had bought the house — regardless of Botha's past — showed the country was moving forward.

"I think it shows the road we have travelled in South Africa, where we are to today.

"It is a slow step but I think we are moving both in racial reconciliation and in economic reconciliation," he said.

The house was put up for sale two months after the apartheid-era leader died in October 2006. Botha's five children however reportedly failed to agree on the value of the property.

Sapa