Chamber:
	National Assembly - Volksraad
Dates of elections / renewal (from/to):
	2 June 1999
Purpose of elections:
	Elections were held for all the seats of the National Assembly on the normal expiry of the members' term of office.
Background and outcome of elections:
	On 3 March 1999, President of the Republic Nelson Mandela announced to the Parliament that South Africa's second all-race general elections would be held on 2 June. Under the terms of the Constitution, the President could only officially set the election date after 30 April but Mr. Mandela said he had revealed it unofficially to allow people to plan accordingly. President Mandela, who had led the nation since the 1994 poll which ended white rule, planned to retire after this election, open to more than 15 million registered voters and contested on the national level by 16 parties. His party -the African National Congress (ANC)- claimed that it had achieved a great deal in the past four years. It had embarked on a far-reaching reform of financial policy and it had enunciated a plausible economic policy. The health system was slowly being overhauled. Housing had made some advances. The delivery of clean water had had considerable success. During the heated electoral campaign, the dominant issues included the ever widening gap between the rich and the poor, the high unemployment rate, rising crime and the poor state of the educational system. Deputy President Thabo Mbeki, Mandela's designated successor, reiterated the ANC's commitment to continued economic growth and reconstruction as well as eliminating crime, corruption and self-enrichment. Meanwhile, the opposition parties attacked the ANC for failure to deliver promises. Apathy and confusion about voting requirements appeared to some analysts as the main reasons of a predicted relatively low turnout, but that did not appear to materialise given the high participation (nearly 90%). Final results, released after five days of vote-counting, gave the ANC a total of 266 of the 400 seats in the National Assembly, that is, one seat short of the two thirds majority required to amend the Constitution. The New National Party (NNP), which had ruled for 46 years of the apartheid era, lost its status as the largest opposition party, coming in fourth place after the Democratic Party (DP), which became the official opposition, and the Zulu nationalist Inkhata Freedom Party (IFP), a long-time rival of the ANC that most pre-election surveys had indicated would do poorly; however, pollsters had apparently overlooked the strength of the rural vote. On June 9 the ANC entered into a coalition with the Indian-led Minority Front (MF), which held one seat in the new Assembly. The coalition agreement ensured that the ANC had the necessary majority to rewrite parts of the Constitution. Mr. Mbeki was sworn in as President on 16 June, and the composition of his Cabinet was announced the next day.

STATISTICS

Round no 1 (2 June 1999): Elections results
Number of registered electors	18 177 000
Voters	16 228 462 (89 %)
Blank or invalid ballot papers	251 320
Valid votes	15 977 142

Round no 1: Distribution of votes
Political Group	Votes	%
African National Congress (ANC)	10 601 330	66.35
Democratic Party (DP)	1 527 337	9.56
Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP)	1 371 477	8.58
New National Party (NNP)	1 098 215	6.87
United Democratic Movement (UDM)	546 790	3.42
African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP)	228 975	1.43
Freedom Front (FF)	127 217	0.80
United Christian Democratic Party (UCDP)	125 280	0.78
Pan Africanist Congress (PAC)	113 215	0.71
Other parties	237 396	1.49

Round no 1: Distribution of seats
Political Group	Total
African National Congress (ANC)	266
Democratic Party (DP)	38
Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP)	33
New National Party (NNP)	27
United Democratic Movement (UDM)	14
African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP)	6
Freedom Front (FF)	3
United Christian Democratic Party (UCDP)	3
Pan Africanist Congress (PAC)	3
Other parties	5

Distribution of seats according to sex:
Men:	280
Women:	120
Percent of women:	30.00