It has been 30 years since apartheid ended. South Africa celebrates rising discontent
Pretoria: South Africa marked 30 years since the end of apartheid and the birth of its democracy on Saturday with a ceremony in the capital that included a 21-gun salute and the raising of the country’s multicolored flag.
But any sense of celebration on this important anniversary was countered by growing discontent with the current government.
President Cyril Ramaphosa, as head of state, presided over the gathering in a huge white tent in the gardens of the Government Buildings in Pretoria.
He also spoke as the leader of the African National Congress party, which is widely credited with liberating South Africa’s black majority from the racist system of oppression that had made the country pariahs for nearly half a century.
The ANC has been in power since the first democratic, all-race elections on 27 April 1994, the vote that officially ended apartheid.
But that Independence Day holiday took place amid a poignant backdrop: Analysts and pollsters predict the party led by Nelson Mandela could lose its parliamentary majority for the first time as a new generation of South Africans faces declining popularity. Let their voices be heard in the most important elections since 1994 to be held next month.
People stand in line to vote in Soweto, South Africa, in the country’s first all-caste election on April 27, 1994. South Africans celebrate “Independence Day” every 27 April, when they remember their country’s first significant democratic elections in 1994, which declared the official end of racial segregation and apartheid oppression. (AP Photo/File)
“Few days in the life of our nation can compare with the day when freedom was born, when black people were allowed to vote for the first time,” Ramaphosa said in a speech focused on nostalgia for 1994. Once the banned ANC came to power, “South Africa changed forever. It signaled a new chapter in our country’s history, a moment that reverberated across Africa and the world.” I heard it.”
Ramaphosa said, “That day, the dignity of all South Africans was restored.”
The President, who stood in front of a banner emblazoned with the word “Freedom”, also acknowledged that while South Africa still has major problems like poverty and inequality three decades later, these issues will once again be central when millions of People will vote. Ramaphosa acknowledged there had been “setbacks”.
The 1994 election transformed South Africa from a country where blacks and other non-white people were denied not only the right to vote, but also most basic freedoms. Laws controlled where they lived, where they were allowed to go on any given day, and what jobs they could get. After apartheid ended, a constitution was adopted guaranteeing the rights of all South Africans, regardless of their race, religion, gender or sexuality.
But this has not significantly improved the lives of millions, with South Africa’s black majority, who make up more than 80 percent of the population of 62 million, still affected by severe poverty.
The official unemployment rate is 32 percent, the highest in the world, and more than 60 percent for youth aged 15 to 24. More than 16 million South Africans – 25 percent of the country – depend on monthly welfare grants to survive.
A crowd of people sing and hold peace signs during a lunchtime peace march in downtown Johannesburg, South Africa, ahead of all-race elections in the country on January 27, 1994. South Africans celebrate “Independence Day” every 27 April, when they remember their country’s first significant democratic elections in 1994, which declared the official end of racial segregation and apartheid oppression. (AP Photo/File)
According to the World Bank, South Africa is still the most unequal country in the world in terms of wealth distribution, with race being a major factor.
Although the damage of apartheid is difficult to undo, the ANC continues to be blamed for South Africa’s current problems.
In the week leading up to the anniversary, countless South Africans were asked what 30 years of freedom from apartheid meant to them. The dominant reaction was that while 1994 was a watershed moment, it is now overshadowed by the unemployment, violent crime, corruption and near collapse of basic services such as electricity and water that plague South Africa in 2024.
It is also touching that many South Africans, who never experienced apartheid and have been called “born frees”, are now old enough to vote.
Outside the tent where Ramaphosa spoke in front of mostly dignitaries and politicians, a group of young black South Africans born after 1994 and who support a new political party called Rise Mzansi chanted “2024 is our 1994”. Wore a T-shirt with the words. Their message was that they were hoping for another change for their future beyond the ANC and in next month’s election.
“They don’t know what happened before 1994. They don’t know,” said Seth Mazibuko, a longtime supporter of Rise Mzansi and a well-known anti-apartheid activist from the 1970s.
“Let’s agree that we’ve messed up,” Mazibuko said of the past 30 years, which has had a direct impact on the youth standing behind them with the second-worst youth unemployment rate in the world after Djibouti.
“There is a new opportunity in the elections next month,” he said.