South Africa's first free election

Johannesburg, South Africa · 1994 · Politics

In April 1994 South Africans of all races voted together for the first time, with long queues stretching outside polling stations. The African National Congress won and Nelson Mandela, released from prison four years earlier, became president, formally ending apartheid.

What happened

From 1948 South Africa's National Party government enforced apartheid, a system of legal racial segregation that denied the Black majority the vote, restricted where people could live and work, and banned opposition movements such as the African National Congress. Internal resistance, international sanctions and economic decline eventually forced change.

In February 1990 President F. W. de Klerk lifted the ban on the ANC and released Nelson Mandela after 27 years in prison. Four years of tense negotiations followed, shadowed by political violence that killed thousands. Mandela and de Klerk shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993.

On 26 to 29 April 1994, South Africans of all races voted together for the first time. Nearly 20 million people cast ballots, many waiting for hours in queues that became one of the defining images of the decade. The ANC won 62.6% of the vote, and on 10 May Mandela was inaugurated in Pretoria as the country's first Black president. The new government set up the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to confront the crimes of the apartheid era.

Around the same time

• The Hong Kong handover, Hong Kong, 1997
• The fall of the Berlin Wall, Berlin, Germany, 1989 to 1990
• The Egyptian revolution, Cairo, Egypt, 2011
• Apollo 11 launches to the Moon, Cape Canaveral, USA, 1969

Earlier: The fall of the Berlin Wall, 1989 to 1990 · Later: The Hong Kong handover, 1997

Further reading

Encyclopedia article: 1994 South African general election (en.wikipedia.org)