South Africa 2018

South Africa is located in the southern part of Africa with an estimated population of 58.78 million people. The economy is largely based on mining, manufacturing and agriculture, with the main exports being gold, diamonds, platinum and other minerals. In terms of foreign relations, South Africa is a member of the African Union and other international organizations such as the United Nations and World Trade Organization. According to extrareference, South Africa is a parliamentary republic with an elected president who serves as head of state while the prime minister serves as head of government. In 2018, Cyril Ramaphosa was elected to serve another term in office as President of South Africa.

Yearbook 2018

South Africa. According to Countryaah.com, Bloemfontein is the capital city of South Africa, a country located in Southern Africa. South Africa’s corruption-accused President Jacob Zuma was pressed with growing demands for resignation, even from his own party ANC (African National Congress). When a distrust vote against Zuma was announced in parliament in February, and the ANC threatened to trap him, Zuma resigned.

Parliament appointed Vice President Cyril Ramaphosa as new president. The decision was welcomed in wide circles, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange went up and the currency rand reached the highest value in three years.

Ramaphosa promised to fight corruption and raised the issue of transferring land from white landowners to black South Africans. Parliament voted to allow this to happen without compensation to the old owners. A committee was commissioned to work on the issue.

• According to Abbreviationfinder: ZAF is an three letter acronym for South Africa.

Two former ministers dismissed by Zuma reappeared in Ramaphosa’s new government on heavy positions as finance minister and minister of state enterprises. New Foreign Minister Lindiwe Sisulu, daughter of ANC legends Walter and Albertina Sisulu.

Ramaphosa decided to rescind a decision from Zuma’s time that had weakened the evidence in corruption trials. It was seen as a sign of the new president’s willingness to deal with corruption.

Jacob Zuma was indicted in April on 16 counts including fraud, blackmail and money laundering from the time before he became president. Prosecution had been filed as early as 2005 but has since been closed down. The trial was expected to last for several months.

In April Winnie passed away Madikizela-Mandela, formerly married to Nelson Mandela and anti-apartheid activist. She was hailed within the ANC as a freedom hero but also accused of crimes; among other things, she was convicted of involvement in the murder of a teenage boy. About 40,000 people attended her funeral in Soweto.

In the north, protests erupted against a lack of jobs, housing and health care, demanding the departure of a corrupt politician. Ramaphosa interrupted a visit to London to try to create calm since police used tear gas and rubber bullets against protesters who set fire to cars and looted shops.

The protests spread to Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban and several cities where thousands of union members rejected the government’s proposed minimum wage. They supported the introduction of the minimum wage but described the proposed 20 rand (about SEK 14) per hour as starvation pay and demanded monthly salary of 12,500 rand (about SEK 8,750), that is, three times as much.

In August, Ramaphosa announced the ANC’s plan to change the constitution so that land could be transferred without compensation. Voluntary sales and purchases had been slow, and the ANC was pressured by the radical opposition party EFF (Economic Freedom Fighters) to hasten the redistribution.

The issue was politically sensitive, and the white farmers’ organization thought that seizing land without compensation would have disastrous consequences. They referred, among other things, to what happened in Zimbabwe and emphasized that investors from outside are turning away from countries that do not protect ownership.

In September, it became clear that South Africa’s economy was declining for the first time since the financial crisis in 2009. GDP fell during the second quarter of the year, a hard blow to Ramaphosa’s plan to boost the economy to help reduce unemployment by about 27%. In agriculture, production had fallen by almost a third in the second quarter.

Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene resigned in October after it was discovered that he had met with the corruption-accused Gupta family. Nene was succeeded by former central bank governor Tito Mboweni, which caused the financial market to react positively. Three Gupta stone-rich brothers have been accused of using their friendship with President Zuma to seize state funds and influence the appointment of ministers.

President Ramaphosa wrote in November under the National Minimum Wage Act. The level will be 20 rand per hour, which corresponds to 3,500 rand per month, approximately SEK 2,275.

Statistics during the year showed that the number of murders in the country increased by more than 7% in one year, the largest increase since the abolition of the apartheid regime. The figures also showed an increase in sexual offenses, most rapes.

Contemporary History of South Africa

South Africa’s contemporary history is the country’s history after 1994, when apartheid was abolished and democracy introduced. On April 27, 1994, the country held its first free elections with voting rights for all, and Nelson Mandela became South Africa’s first democratically elected president.

Although South Africa has implemented a number of reforms since 1994, society is struggling with the effects of the apartheid era. The legacy of apartheid is particularly noticeable in the face of great poverty and enduring strong inequality. This largely coincides with the distinction between blacks and whites. In recent years, there has been a growing criticism of the ruling party, including for the inability to even out differences and for increasing corruption.

The Fall of Apartheid

Racial segregation policy had broad support among the white population of South Africa. These made up about 15 percent of the population at the beginning of the 1990s. The support was particularly strong among Africans – the descendants of immigrants from the Netherlands, Germany and France. Most voters from this group gave their support to the ruling Nationalist Party and the architects of apartheid politics. Among the English-speaking whites, there was greater support for the white opposition parties who advocated a more subdued and liberal version of racial segregation policy.

Apartheid politics cracked down in its joints throughout the 1980s. Political opposition was increasing and out of control for the authorities. At the same time, it became increasingly difficult to combine the dependence on African labor with a desire to keep most people banished to the countryside reserves. This initially led to experimentation with certain reforms that would give privileges to smaller groups of Africans and to the Indian and colored minorities. This failed and and helped the forces of the apartheid regime realized the need for more comprehensive reforms.

With the election of Frederik W. de Klerk as new president in September 1989, the ban on the ANC – African National Congress and 35 other organizations was lifted. On February 11, 1990, Nelson Mandela was released after 27 years in prison. This paved the way for negotiations between the government and the ANC, for a new temporary constitution, and for South Africa’s first election with voting rights for all.

The election was held in April 1994. The Liberation Movement ANC got 63 percent of the vote. The Nationalist Party, the former government party got 20 percent. The third largest was the Inkatha Freedom Party with 11 percent of the vote. This party was ethnically rooted with its strongest support among rural Zulu voters in what is today the KwaZulu-Natal province. The electoral system ensured that all parties were given mandates that corresponded to percentage support. No barrier also ensured that a number of small parties also got a seat in the new parliament.

The Provisional Constitution of 1993 ensured that the new South Africa was led by a coalition government in which all three major parties were represented. With the adoption of the final constitution in 1996, the Nationalist Party resigned from the government while the Inkatha party remained until the next election in 1999.