south africans are realising that if they don t change the way they vote, south africa is going to end up in a very, very dark place. there will be anarchy, there will be looting all over this country because nothing will be working. - if certain things are not resolved we will become a failed state. the anc, mandela s party, has ruled uninterrupted for 29 years. is a day of reckoning coming? welcome to hardtalk, on the road from south africa. i m stephen sackur. back in 1994, the one overwhelming emotion in this country was hope. the repressive, racist apartheid regime had been toppled. the new power in the land was the african national congress, promising a better life for all south africans. well, three decades on, it s time to judge how the anc is doing. to too many south africans, this looks and feels like a story of failure. khayelitsha township, cape town. nestled under majestic table mountain, a sprawling reminder of south africa s status as the most unequal society
- rudolph giuliani, thank you for being with us. - thank you. - and in new york city s race for mayor, democrat david dinkins is leading in the polls over republican rudolph giuliani. - all of a sudden, david dinkins comes along, riding the wave of, you know, he was gonna be the first black mayor. and that was at a time when that had a real kind of emotional resonance, both within new york and nationally. - it was a historic day for new york and a triumphant moment for the biggest black population of any american city. - quiet! quiet! - rudy very quickly seems to have made the decision to embrace the sort of racism that a lot of his party believed in. - white power! - i saw god out on the block today he was darker than the preachers say with a teardrop tattooed on his face and dirt in his fingers i heard angels when he laughed the way that people do when they have known true pain for his sins i don t know who to blame what choice was he given?
overwhelming emotion in this country was hope. the repressive, racist apartheid regime had been toppled. the new power in the land was the african national congress, promising a better life for all south africans. well, three decades on, it is time to judge how the anc is doing. for too many south africans, this looks and feels like a story of failure. khayelitsha township, cape town. nestled under majestic table mountain. a sprawling reminder of south africa s status as the most unequal society on earth. in africa s most advanced economy, at least half of young people can t find work. life here is never easy, but right now, south africa s power crisis is hitting the poorest hardest. no one in khayelitsha wants to be sick when the power is off. but it happens every day. the main township hospital has had to adapt to what they call load shedding . the man in charge is david binza. with load shedding now in place, and the different stages instead of reducing they are actually
it s just a matter of how fast, did you really believe that? of course i believed it then. i think it s a fair assessment about where the anc find themselves in the last local government elections, in 2021, they, for the first time in post democratic south africa, lost their majority and fell below 50%. this obviously allied with the fact that our economy s not growing, we ve got 30 million people living in poverty, 12 million people unemployed, and loadshedding, rolling blackouts, which have reached into every home and switched off the lights, switched off our factories, and switched off our economy. south africans are realising that if they don t change the way they vote, south africa is going to end up in a very, very dark place, and it s going to be poverty and inequality deepening. well, in that bleak context that you ve just outlined, with the unemployment, what they call here loadshedding , the rolling power cuts, the massive economic problems, how is it that the m
the repressive, racist apartheid regime had been toppled. the new power in the land was the african national congress, promising a better life for all south africans. well, three decades on, it s time to judge how the anc is doing. to too many south africans, this looks and feels like a story of failure. khayelitsha township, cape town. nestled under majestic table mountain, a sprawling reminder of south africa s status as the most unequal society on earth. in africa s most advanced economy, at least half of young people can t find work. life here is never easy but, right now, south africa s power crisis is hitting the poorest hardest. no one in khayelitsha wants to be sick when the power is off, but it happens every day. the main township hospital has had to adapt to what they call load shedding . the man in charge is david binza. with load shedding now in place and the different stages, instead of reducing, they are actually increasing. we ve had to adjust our lives and wo