{"id":644189,"date":"2019-05-08T13:09:28","date_gmt":"2019-05-08T13:09:28","guid":{"rendered":"
\"African<\/div>

The Afri"},"modified":"2019-05-08T13:09:28","modified_gmt":"2019-05-08T13:09:28","slug":"south-africas-ruling-anc-in-10-dates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2019\/05\/08\/south-africas-ruling-anc-in-10-dates\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa\u2019s ruling ANC in 10 dates"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The African National Congress led the struggle that toppled apartheid in 1994 and has ruled South Africa ever since, remaining the most popular party despite a series of scandals.<\/p>\n

Here are 10 key dates in the history of the party formed more than 100 years ago.<\/p>\n

\u2013 1912: founded \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

The South African Native National Congress was founded in 1912 in response to discrimination against blacks in the then-Union of South Africa, established two years earlier through the merger of white-run colonies and territories.<\/p>\n

The movement changed its name to ANC in 1923.<\/p>\n

\u2013 1952: defiance \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

After the white-minority National Party government institutionalised the apartheid system in 1948, the ANC organised its first mass \u201cDefiance Campaign\u201d in 1952.<\/p>\n

Tens of thousands of blacks broke curfews, burned their \u201cpassbook\u201d identity documents which were obligatory to carry, and entered whites-only areas at the risk of going to jail.<\/p>\n

In 1959, a rebel faction created the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC).<\/p>\n

\u2013 1960: banned \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 1960, police opened fire on a demonstration against passbooks, killing 69 people in what became known as the Sharpeville Massacre.<\/p>\n

In the aftermath, the government banned the PAC and ANC, which went underground.<\/p>\n

The following year, Nelson Mandela created the ANC\u2019s military wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation), that launched an armed struggle against apartheid.<\/p>\n

\u2013 1964: leaders jailed \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mandela, Walter Sisulu, and other ANC leaders were jailed for life in 1964 for sabotage and conspiracy.<\/p>\n

The ANC continued to fight apartheid in exile from London, Dar es Salaam and Lusaka, and allied itself with the Soviet bloc.<\/p>\n

\u2013 1985: secret talks start \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

The ANC\u2019s leadership in exile held the first secret talks with apartheid officials in Zambia in 1985.<\/p>\n

In July 1989, there was a first clandestine meeting between Mandela, still a prisoner, and hardline president P.W. Botha.<\/p>\n

In December of that year, Mandela met the new president, F.W. de Klerk.<\/p>\n

\u2013 1990: unbanned \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

De Klerk unbanned the ANC and other groups in 1990, also releasing Mandela and other political prisoners.<\/p>\n

Mandela became ANC president the following year.<\/p>\n

\u2013 1994: ANC in power \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

The first elections open to all races were held in April 1994, with the ANC winning 62.6 percent and Mandela becoming South Africa\u2019s first black president.<\/p>\n

Thabo Mbeki took over in 1999 but his two terms were tarnished by allegations of abuse of power and denial about the AIDS epidemic ravaging the country.<\/p>\n

\u2013 2009: first Zulu leader \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

The ANC compelled Mbeki to resign in 2008, before the end of his second term, amid a power struggle with party leader Jacob Zuma.<\/p>\n

It led some ANC members to break away to form the Congress of the People (COPE) party.<\/p>\n

The ANC won 2009 elections by 65.9 per cent and Zuma became the first president from the Zulu ethnic group. Mandela and Mbeki were both Xhosa.<\/p>\n

The party expelled radical youth leader Julius Malema in 2012 and he established the Economic Freedom Front (EFF).<\/p>\n

\u2013 2016: election setback \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

In its worst election result since the end of white-minority rule, the ANC took less than 54 per cent of the vote at 2016 municipal polls.<\/p>\n

It also lost an absolute majority in five of the six biggest metropolitan areas.<\/p>\n

\u2013 2018: Zuma forced out \u2013<\/strong><\/p>\n

After a nine-year presidential term marked by corruption scandals and an economic slowdown, Zuma was forced to resign by the ANC in 2018.<\/p>\n

He was replaced by his deputy, Cyril Ramaphosa, who vowed to tackle state corruption.<\/p>\n

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