SOUTH AFRICA
Masses secure landslide vote for ANC
By
Monica Moorehead
On June 2, millions of South African voters showed strong
electoral support for the African National Congress-led
government. In the second national election of the
post-apartheid era, the ANC won 66.4 percent of the vote--just
shy of a two-thirds majority of the parliament.
Since the elections the Minority Front, a predominantly
Indian immigrant grouping that gained one seat in parliament,
has formed an alliance with the ANC. This alliance gives the
ANC a two-thirds majority.
On June 14, long-time ANC leader Thabo Mbeki was selected by
the newly-elected parliament as the overwhelming choice to
succeed legendary freedom fighter Nelson Mandela as the next
president of South Africa. He will be inaugurated June 16.
Mbeki is an economist and is characterized within some
bourgeois circles as an intellectual and diplomat. It remains
to be seen how the relationship between Mbeki and the white
corporate executives who still control the capitalist South
African economy will develop.
One reason the ANC vote was 3 percent higher than in the
1994 elections was more support from the so-called colored or
"mixed race" communities, especially in the Cape Town region.
This is certainly a progressive development. Traditionally,
this ethnic grouping supported the once-ruling National Party,
which came to power in 1948 and consolidated apartheid as a
political system.
The ANC received overwhelming support during the elections
from its longtime allies, the Congress of South African Trade
Unions and the South African Communist Party. These three
groups make up the Tripartite Alliance, which was formed before
the legal demise of apartheid six years ago. Both COSATU and
the SACP were instrumental in helping to write the
post-apartheid South African Constitution.
The ANC, COSATU and the SACP have their roots deeply
embedded within the struggle of the oppressed South African
Black majority against the economic and political repression of
the racist apartheid regime.
COSATU and the SACP were actively involved in the electoral
process. They distributed literature to the masses outlining
the achievements made by the ANC-led government in the first
five years of Black-majority political rule.
Among these achievements are a guaranteed minimum wage for
farm workers and domestic workers; the right to form and join
unions; the right to strike; the construction of 700,000 homes
for 3 million people; water, electricity and phone connections
for millions; the building or upgrading of 500 clinics that
provide free medical care for children and pregnant women; the
creation of 10,000 new classrooms for 5 million children;
abolition of the death penalty; and prohibition of
discrimination based on gender, race and sexual
orientation.
With all these economic and political advancements, there
still remains a tremendous amount of suffering and inequality
in South Africa, legacies of apartheid and the continued
existence of capitalism. The unemployment level in Black
townships is approaching an astounding 40 percent, resulting in
more and more crimes of survival. South Africa also has
millions of people dying of AIDS.
The ANC's election victory does signal a new phase in the
ongoing struggle of South Africa's workers and oppressed for
total liberation from the yoke of private property and
super-exploitation for profit.
The writer was an international observer at the first ANC
national convention held in Durban, South Africa, in July 1991.
It was the first public ANC conference held inside the country
since the national liberation movement had been banned under
apartheid in 1959.
This article is copyright under a Creative Commons License.
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