South Africa election set for April

South Africa’s third all-race election will be held on April 14, President Thabo Mbeki announced in Parliament today.

Voting to elect MPs and president will take place 10 years after Nelson Mandela became the country’s first black president in April 1994 in an election which brought the African National Congress to power.

Mbeki, who succeeded Mandela in 1999, is expected to easily win a second term.

The new President is expected to be sworn in on April 27, the anniversary of the elections ten years ago that ended decades of racist rule.

Mbeki’s announcement comes after complaints from opposition parties who wanted enough time to campaign for the vote.

The ANC rules in seven of South Africa’s 10 provinces. In the Western Cape province it is in a coalition agreement with the New National Party, a renamed version of the National Party which ruled in the apartheid era.

The Zulu nationalist Inkatha Freedom Party led by Mangosuthu Buthelezi runs the KwaZulu-Natal province.

Buthelezi who is also the home affairs minister in the national government has slammed the ANC for failing to aggressively confront the AIDS pandemic ravaging the country.

Inkatha which often clashed violently with the ANC during apartheid joined a unity government after the 1994 election, but its coalition with the ANC collapsed midway through the current five-year parliamentary term, ending in April.

The main opposition party is the Democratic Alliance.