South Africa

**South Africa**, officially the **Republic of South Africa**, is a country in Africa. It is the southern-most country on the African continent and shares land borders with Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Swaziland. It also enclaves Lesotho.

## History

### Post-Independence

Eight years after the end of the Second Boer War and after four years of negotiation, an act of the British Parliament (South Africa Act 1909) granted nominal independence, while creating the Union of South Africa on 31 May 1910. The Union was a dominion that included the former territories of the Cape and Natal colonies, as well as the republics of Orange Free State and Transvaal.

In 1931 the union was fully sovereign from the United Kingdom with the passage of the Statute of Westminster, which abolishes the last powers of the British Government on the country. In 1934, the South African Party and National Party merged to form the United Party, seeking reconciliation between Afrikaners and English-speaking "Whites". In 1939 the party split over the entry of the Union into World War II as an ally of the United Kingdom, a move which the National Party followers strongly opposed.

In 1948, the National Party was elected to power. It strengthened the racial segregation begun under Dutch and British colonial rule. The Nationalist Government classified all peoples into three races and developed rights and limitations for each. The white minority (less than 20%) controlled the vastly larger black majority. The legally institutionalised segregation became known as apartheid. While whites enjoyed the highest standard of living in all of Africa, comparable to First World Western nations, the black majority remained disadvantaged by almost every standard, including income, education, housing, and life expectancy. The Freedom Charter, adopted in 1955 by the Congress Alliance, demanded a non-racial society and an end to discrimination.

### Republic

On 31 May 1961, the country became a republic following a referendum in which white voters narrowly voted in favour thereof. Queen Elizabeth II was stripped of the title Queen of South Africa, and the last Governor-General, namely Charles Robberts Swart, became State President. As a concession to the Westminster system, the presidency remained parliamentary appointed and virtually powerless until P. W. Botha's Constitution Act of 1983, which (intact in these regards) eliminated the office of Prime Minister and instated a near-unique "strong presidency" responsible to parliament. Pressured by other Commonwealth of Nations countries, South Africa left the organisation in 1961 and was readmitted only in 1994.

Despite opposition both within and outside the country, the government legislated for a continuation of apartheid. The security forces harshly oppressed resistance movements, and violence became widespread, with anti-apartheid activists using strikes, marches, protests, and sabotage by bombing and other means. The African National Congress (ANC) was a major resistance movement. Apartheid became increasingly controversial, and some Western nations and institutions began to boycott business with South Africa because of its racial policies and suppression of civil rights. International sanctions, divestment of holdings by investors accompanied growing unrest and oppression within South Africa.

In 1990 the National Party government took the first step towards dismantling discrimination when it lifted the ban on the African National Congress and other political organisations. It released Nelson Mandela from prison after twenty-seven years' serving a sentence for sabotage. A negotiation process followed. With approval from an predominantly white referendum, the government repealed apartheid legislation. South Africa also destroyed its nuclear arsenal and acceded to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. South Africa held its first universal elections in 1994, which the ANC won by an overwhelming majority. It has been in power ever since. The country rejoined the Commonwealth of Nations.

## Government and Politics

South Africa is a parliamentary republic with the President as both head of state and head of government, and depends for his tenure on the confidence of Parliament, and is elected from the National Assembly for a five-year term, renewable once. The National Assembly, the lower house of Parliament, consists of 400 members and is elected every five years by a system of party-list proportional representation. The National Council of Provinces, the upper house, consists of ninety members, with each of the nine provincial legislatures electing ten members.

### Administrative Divisions

South Africa is divided into nine provinces, with are then subdivided into 52 districts and 226 local municiaplities. The provinces are:

* East Cape
* Free State
* Gauteng
* KwaZulu-Natal
* Limpopo
* Mpumalanga
* North West
* Northern Cape
* Western Cape

### Foreign Relations

South Africa is a member of the African Union, G-30, African Treaty Cooperation, Commonwealth of Nations and BRICS economic group. South Africa is a founding member of the South African Free Trade Association. As one of the African 'Big Five', alongside the East African Federation, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia and Nigeria, South Africa is seen as one of the key drivers of greater African integration and defence from the North African Caliphate. South Africa maintains close trade ties with China and India, as the largest trade partners with those countries.

## Economy

**South Africa** is generally considered a rising economic power and has thriving mining and tourism industries. The country is particularly famous for its abundant mineral resources including gold, diamonds, chrome, manganese, platinum, vanadium, vermiculite, ilmenite, palladium, rutile, zirconium and coal. **South Africa** is the most developed and industrialized nation on the African continent. It joined the BRICS grouping of the largest emerging economies in 2010.

In 2023, **South Africa** founded the South African Free Trade Organization, comprising itself and other southern African nations as a regional trading block. By 2027, SAFTO included every country south of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the East African Federation and also included the island nation of Madagascar. SAFTO attracted Chinese investment in mining and infrastructure including a Chinese built HSR line from Cape Town to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. While building an informal economic sphere of influence in southern Africa, **South Africa** also expanded trade and bilateral investment between itself and the newly formed East African Federation in the 2020s and 2030s. Although plagued by corruption and poverty, **South Africa** was nonetheless an engine for growth on the African continent.