South Africans vote in election seen as country’s most important in 30 years

People queue to cast their votes at a polling station in Cape Town, South Africa (Nardus Engelbrecht/AP)

South Africans have begun voting in an election seen as their country’s most important in 30 years and one that could put their young democracy in unknown territory.

At stake is the three-decade dominance of the African National Congress (ANC) party, which led South Africa out of apartheid’s brutal white minority rule in 1994.