JOHANNESBURG (AP) — As 72-year-old Nonki Kunene walks the halls of Thabisang Elementary School in Soweto, South Africa, she remembers the joy she and many others felt 30 years ago when they voted for the first time.
It was at this school on April 27, 1994 that Kunene joined millions of South Africans to brave long queues and vote in the country’s first democratic elections, after decades of rule by a white minority that denied blacks the right to vote.
But as the country prepares to celebrate 30 years of freedom and democracy on Saturday, much of the excitement and optimism of that period has evaporated as Africa’s most developed economy faces a host of challenges.
Like many things in South Africa, the school Kunene remembers has changed, and the former school hall has now been converted into several classrooms.
“Somehow I wish we could go back to that day because of my excitement and the things that happened afterward,” Kunene said, referring to the appointment of Nelson Mandela as the country’s first black president and the introduction of a new constitution offered all the South the opportunity of equal rights for Africans and the abolition of the racially discriminatory system of apartheid.
For many who experienced apartheid, these years remain etched in their collective memory.
“I cannot forget how we suffered at the hands of the whites. At night in the city there were white bikers with hair like this (describing a mohawk hairstyle) who would brutally attack a black man if they saw him walking on the sidewalk. “Those white boys were cruel,” said 87-year-old Lily Makhanya, whose late husband died while working in the underground structures of the anti-apartheid movement.
“If they saw you walking on the sidewalk, you would be attacked so badly and left for dead.”
For Makhanya and many others who stood in line to vote in 1994, it marked a turning point from a brutal past to the promise of a successful future.
But 30 years later, much of that optimism has evaporated in the face of the country’s pressing challenges. This includes rising inequality as the country’s black majority continues to live in poverty and the unemployment rate is the highest in the world at over 32%.
According to official statistics, more than 16 million South Africans rely on monthly welfare payments to survive.
Public demonstrations are commonplace as communities protest the failure of the ruling African National Congress to create jobs and provide basic services such as water and electricity.
An electricity crisis that led to blackouts that devastated the country’s economy has compounded the party’s woes, with businesses and households sometimes forced to go without power for up to 12 hours a day.
Areas like the affluent Johannesburg suburb of Sandton, home to beautiful skyscrapers and luxurious homes, are an example of the economic success enjoyed by a minority of the country’s 60 million people.
But the township of Alexandra, just a few kilometers from Sandton, clearly reflects the living conditions of the country’s poor black majority, where sewage flows from burst pipes onto the streets and uncollected rubbish piles up on pavements.
Such contradictions are widespread in major cities, including the capital Pretoria and the city of Cape Town, and remain at the heart of what is expected to be one of the country’s most hotly contested elections next month.
For the first time since the ANC came to power in 1994, polls suggest the party could receive less than 50% of the national vote, which would result in a loss of power if it fails to form a coalition with some smaller parties .
For some younger voters, like 24-year-old Donald Mkhwanazi, the nostalgia doesn’t resonate.
Mkhwanazi will vote for the first time in the May 29 election and is now actively campaigning for a new political party, Rise Mzansi, which will contest a national election for the first time.
“I had the opportunity to vote in 2019 and in the 2021 local elections, but I did not do so because none of these old parties sufficiently convinced me why I should vote,” he said.
“Because of what has happened over the last 30 years, I didn’t see the need to vote. We talk about freedom, but are we free from crime, are we free from poverty? What freedom are we talking about?”
Political analyst Pearl Mncube said South Africans were right to feel abandoned by their leaders.
“More and more South Africans are skeptical about statements from the government, as it has a history of announcing big plans without prioritizing the rapid implementation of these plans,” Mncube said.
She said that while Freedom Day was meant to symbolize the country’s transition from an oppressive past, it was important to highlight current problems and plans to overcome them.
“We cannot use the past and the nostalgia associated with it to avoid dealing with the present,” she said.
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