Green Left Weekly's NORM DIXON spoke to movement activists about their feelings as they cast their votes in the historic democratic elections.
Nombonisa Gasa, head of the ANC's Commission on the Emancipation of Women:
When I got my first ballot paper and got to the booth, for a second or two, I couldn't get hold of myself. I was very excited, literally giggling. When I was walking out of the gate of the polling station I was very emotional. It was a special moment ...
The struggle doesn't end with just casting your vote. An ANC-led government of national unity is going to need help and assistance from people outside to make sure everything does happen.
We also need to have independent structures to ensure that the government is delivering but also to ensure that democracy is not interfered with. The women's struggle is going to be independent and it is not going to be manipulated by any party.
Every woman, every South African, needs to belong to organisations who are going to be lobbying and supporting the government.
Peter Ngobese, Group for Environmental Monitoring and the Environmental Justice Networking Forum:
There is a lot of work that must be done, administratively and legislatively, for the environment. There are a range of issues that are environmental — basic human rights of housing, water, sanitation. Programs to meet these basic needs must be implemented while at the same time being environmentally sound.
The new government should support a movement outlook. It is important for people to monitor the situation and retain the leverage we have had in the past to make sure those changes are made. I don't think there is less to be done by the environment movement, there may more, although in a supportive rather than an oppositional way.
Parks Mankahlana, ANC Youth League:
I waited from 12 noon until 10 to 10 in the evening ... As I was about to cast my vote, I really felt equal for the first time. Because I knew the ANC would win the election I got this great feeling that I was physically removing de Klerk from power.
The major challenge is to deal with the problems confronting young people. The primary problem is the inaccessibility of education and the state of chaos in the education system. When the new president speaks in Pretoria, we want him to announce specific measures.
As the ANCYL, we are intending to ensure that the president creates jobs especially for young people. And a much more proactive role in dealing with violence and promoting national reconciliation must be adopted.
We have no reason to believe the government will not deliver.
Simon Nkoli, activist in the Gay and Lesbian Organisation of the Witwatersrand and an AIDS educator with the Township Aids Project:
I am one of the people who is overjoyed. The task now is to ensure that I and other lesbian and gay people continue fighting. I don't think attitudes of people are going to change just because the ANC has won. The ANC will face opposition from the National Party. We should continue fighting and see to it that the constitutional clause that protects the rights of gay and lesbian people does not get removed.
AIDS will remain a problem in this country whether there is a new government or not. I think people should continue to fight. The government should fund AIDS organisations. There were a lot of countries that were funding AIDS education in South Africa that took their money and redirected it into voter education. I think that money should be restored. AIDS education should not stop; the disease won't.
Jeremy Cronin, central committee member, South African Communist Party:
I heard an elderly African woman say it wasn't just about houses and education, it was about dignity. That went for whites as well, including myself. Although I had been nominally a citizen, I felt like one for the first time as I voted with my comrades.
We have to really ensure that the Reconstruction and Development Program starts to get implemented. We are going to have an ANC-led government but it is going to be threatened on all sides by an incumbent civil service, security forces inherited from the past and the powers that be in the economy.
The comrades in the government and the comrades in the mass movement face a long struggle. We are talking about a program of struggle from different positions inside and outside of government. If we, as the left and working class forces, have not begun to produce change, we need to blame ourselves. We can't wait passively for two or three years and then throw stones.
Patrick Chan, central committee member, Workers' Organisation for Socialist Action:
It is a very significant election. The ANC will be able to introduce some social changes that we are all clamouring for. The post-election period is going to be one of very significant changes, but all within the framework of the capitalist society. That is the shortcoming of the ANC's deal with capital and the National Party.
For activists within the mass movement, the task is going to be to carry their demands as far forward as possible — jobs for all, free education, adequate housing, free health care — to put huge pressures on the ANC so that we can obtain these changes.
Paul Monnakgotla, Soweto Students' Representative Council member from the Morris Isaacson High School:
If the new government does not bring real change, we will make sure that it answers to the people. Our songs say "sohlala siyinyova", which means we shall remain activists.
Golden Miles Bhudu, chief executive of the South African Prisoners' Organisation for Human Rights:
Our struggle for a democratised prison and justice system will start in earnest after the installation of the government of national unity. We anticipate no difficulties from the new government.
But the moment they show us that they are not representative, we will definitely take to the streets. We are going to be vigorous, more aggressive. We have the support of the grassroots of the ANC, PAC and other liberation organisations. We will use that support to force the government to listen to, and meet, our reasonable demands.