page_title: Flag of South Africa
section_title: Current flag since 1994
hierarchical_section_title: Flag of South Africa / History / Current flag since 1994
caption_attribution_description: A cricket shot from Privatemusings, taken at the third day of the SCG Test between Australia and South Africa.
context_page_description: The flag of South Africa was designed in March 1994 and adopted on 27 April 1994, at the beginning of South Africa's 1994 general election, to replace the flag that had been used since 1928. The new national flag, designed by the then State Herald of South Africa Frederick Brownell, was chosen to represent the country's new democracy after the end of apartheid.
  The flag has horizontal bands of red and blue, of equal width, separated by a central green band which splits into a horizontal "Y" shape, the arms of which end at the corners of the hoist side. The "Y" embraces a black isosceles triangle from which the arms are separated by narrow yellow or gold bands; the red and blue bands are separated from the green band and its arms by narrow white stripes. The stripes at the fly end are in the 5:1:3:1:5 ratio. Three of the flag's colours were taken from the flags of the Boer Republics and the Union Jack, while the remaining three colours were taken from the flag of the African National Congress.
context_section_description: The present South African national flag was first flown on 27 April 1994, the day of the 1994 election. However, the flag was first intended to be an interim flag only, and its design was decided upon only a week beforehand.
  The choice of a new flag was part of the negotiation process set in motion when Nelson Mandela was released from prison in 1990. When a nationwide public competition was held in 1993, the National Symbols Commission received more than 7,000 designs. Six designs were shortlisted and presented to the public and the Negotiating Council, but none elicited enthusiastic support. A number of design studios were then contacted to submit further proposals, but these also did not find favour. Parliament went into recess at the end of 1993 without a suitable candidate for the new national flag.
  In February 1994, Cyril Ramaphosa and Roelf Meyer, the chief negotiators of the African National Congress and the National Party government of the day respectively, were given the task of resolving the flag issue. A final design was adopted on 15 March 1994, derived from a design developed by the State Herald Fred Brownell, who had also previously designed the Namibian flag. This interim flag was hoisted officially for the first time on the 27 April 1994, the day when the nation's first fully inclusive elections commenced which resulted in Nelson Mandela being inaugurated as South Africa's first democratically elected president on 10 May 1994. The flag was well received by most South Africans, though a small minority objected to it; hundreds of Afrikaner Volksfront members in Bloemfontein burned the flag in protest a few weeks before the April 1994 elections.
  The proclamation of the new national flag by South African President F. W. de Klerk was only published on 20 April 1994, a mere seven days before the flag was to be inaugurated, sparking a frantic last-minute flurry for flag manufacturers. As stated in South Africa's post-apartheid interim constitution, the flag was to be introduced on an interim probationary period of five years, after which there would be discussion about whether or not to change the national flag in the final draft of the constitution. The Constitutional Assembly was charged with the responsibility of drafting the country's new constitution and had called for submissions, inter alia, on the issues of its various national symbols.  It received 118 submissions recommending the retention of the new flag and 35 suggesting changes to it.  Thus on 28 September 1995 it decided that the flag should be retained unchanged and accordingly it was included as Section One of the Constitution of South Africa which came into force in February 1997.
caption: The flag flying at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
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