S Africa\\\'s \\\'born-frees\\\' cast first ballots

May 08, 2014 00:00:00

SOUTH AFRICA : South African voters queue at a polling station in the restive Bekkersdal township during the early hours Wednesday. — AFP

SOWETO, May 7 (AFP): Nervous but excited, South Africa's "born-free" generation voted for the first time on Wednesday, with many still expressing a deep gratitude to the ruling African National Congress for leading the struggle against apartheid.

"It feels good that I am voting for the first time and I am proud that I will be voting for the ANC," said 20-year-old Nonhlahla Nkomo.

"It deserves my vote. I am in a free South Africa because of the ANC," said Nkomo, a beauty therapy student.

At Orlando West school, a stone's throw from former president and ANC leader Nelson Mandela's Soweto township house, a handful of young South Africans joined their parents and grandparents in queues to cast ballots in the country's fifth democratic elections.

The minimum voting age is 18 and with South Africa's democracy turning 20 this year around two million "born frees"-those who have no memory of apartheid-were eligible to vote for the first time.

But only a third of that generation-around 646,000 -- bothered to register to cast their ballots.

Although they have no personal experience of life under the former racist white minority regime, they are daily reminded of those dark days, especially those growing up in Soweto, a former hotbed of the liberation struggle.

Many blacks from impoverished backgrounds have benefited from social grants and education loans introduced by the ANC government.

"ANC is the reason I have been able to go to school," said Lehlogonolo Gumede, a 23-year-old BA student. "And I am voting for Mandela's legacy."

Her friend Dinah Gumede, 19, thinks no other party has the capacity to govern South Africa.

"It's ANC which has got the capital. It's big, it's got the resources to change things-that is if it sticks to its manifestos," she said.

Lesedi Nene, 19, from Orlando West, said: "I am kind of nervous, thinking 'Have I made a good decision or not?'"

Nene says his history studies have guided his vote: "Now I can see the difference, and that's why I just feel I have done the right thing to vote for the ANC."