Apr. 27 South Africa - Freedom Day

Today, South Africa celebrates the 14th anniversary of freedom. It's the commemoration of the first democratic election on 27 Apr. 1994, and the last phase in the dismantling of a decades-old evil system of separation, suppression and dehumanisation.

After years of struggle against the apartheid system of white minority rule and international pressure, Nelson Mandela is released in 1990. After painstaking negotiations, political parties finally agree on 27 April 1994 as the date for South Africa's first multi-racial elections, giving the country's majority black population the right to vote for the first time. The elections were the first non-racial, democratic elections where everyone of voting age of over 18 from every race group was allowed to vote.