Charlene Wittstock          - 6/7/2011      <--Prev : Next-->




1) EDITORIAL

Charlene Wittstock is OUR Princess not South Africa's !! Charlene was born in Bulawayo at the Mater Dei hospital in fact - how dare SA claim OUR princess.??

Charlene, Princess of Monaco born 25 January 1978) is the wife of Albert II, Prince of Monaco, and is a former South African competitive swimmer.

Charlene is the daughter of Michael and Lynette Wittstock. She was born in Rhodesia (present-day Zimbabwe) to a family of German and English descent, but her family relocated to Gauteng, South Africa, in 1989. She represented South Africa at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, with her team finishing fifth in the women's 4 100 m medley. She retired from competitive swimming in 2007.

She met Prince Albert in 2000 at a swimming event in Monaco. They were first seen together in 2006, and she has accompanied Albert on many of his official duties since then. They announced their engagement in June 2010 and were married on 1 July 2011.

The controversy surrounding the wedding of Prince Albert of Monaco to Charlene Wittstock has not stopped Bulawayo claiming the princess as one of their own.

The wedding of Prince Albert of Monaco to Charlene Wittstock has been all over the news since the 1st July 2011 ceremony. The bride is generally described as South African but she was actually born in the city of Bulawayo in the southern part of Zimbabwe, in the Mater Dei hospital. The hospital was one of the main maternity units at the time and is run by Catholic nuns.

Charlene has two younger brothers. Her mother Lynette Wittstock was a former competitive diver and swimming coach which is from where Charlene got her love of swimming. The family moved to Benoni, near Johannesburg, South Africa in 1989 when Charlene was 12.