In April 1994, Nelson Mandela became South Africa's first-ever black president. Though South Africans and the world see great hope for the country's future, it is clear that reversing apartheid's legacy of inequality and poverty will take a long time. Today, more than 70 percent of all South Africans live in poverty. The majority of the poor live in rural areas. Twelve million households in South Africa do not have access to safe drinking water.
Violent crime threatens internal stability and jeopardizes the country's valuable tourist industry.
Students protest inadequate educational facilities, often vandalizing or even destroying schools in the process. World Vision's director for South Africa, Sheldon Rankin, spoke with writer Ann Hudock about the progress of South Africa's transformation and World Vision's work there. There was also a fear of right-wing violence and the possibility of anarchy. All that has changed dramatically, given the strength of liberation for all, both black and white. Apartheid had so skillfully and successfully set a barrier between people that, although we're brothers in the same land, we really didn't participate In one another's world.