![]() ![]() In the 1940s, Alfred Bitini Xuma revived some of Gumede's programmes, assisted by a surge in trade union activity and by the formation in 1944 of the left-wing ANC Youth League under a new generation of activists, among them Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela, and Oliver Tambo. When Josiah Gumede took over as ANC president in 1927, he advocated for a strategy of mass mobilisation and cooperation with the Communist Party, but was voted out of office in 1930 and replaced with the traditionalist Seme, whose leadership saw the ANC's influence wane. Around 1920, in a partial shift away from its early focus on the "politics of petitioning", the ANC developed a programme of passive resistance directed primarily at the expansion and entrenchment of pass laws. As a result, King Jongilizwe donated 50 cows to during its founding. Although they would not take part, Xhosa chiefs would show huge support for the organisation. Writer and historian, Walter Rubusana founded the organisation alongside Sol Plaatje, John Dube and Pixley ka Isaka Seme who like much of the ANC's early membership, were drawn from the conservative, educated, and religious professional classes of black South African society. Main article: History of the African National Congress Origins Ī successor of the Cape Colony's Imbumba Yamanyama organisation, the ANC was founded as the South African Native National Congress in Bloemfontein on 8 January 1912, and was renamed the African National Congress in 1923. Over the last decade, the party has been embroiled in a number of controversies, particularly relating to widespread allegations of political corruption among its members. However, the ANC's electoral majority has declined consistently since 2004, and in the most recent elections – the 2021 local elections – its share of the national vote dropped below 50% for the first time ever. South Africa is considered a dominant-party state. Partly due to its Tripartite Alliance with the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions, it has retained a comfortable electoral majority at the national level and in most provinces, and has provided each of South Africa's five presidents since 1994. In the post-apartheid era, the ANC continues to identify itself foremost as a liberation movement, although it is also a registered political party. However, it positioned itself as a key player in the negotiations to end apartheid, which began in earnest after the ban was repealed in 1990. The ANC was condemned as a terrorist organisation by the governments of South Africa, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Headquartered in Lusaka, Zambia, the exiled ANC dedicated much of its attention to a campaign of sabotage and guerrilla warfare against the apartheid state, carried out under its military wing, uMkhonto we Sizwe, which was founded in 1961 in partnership with the South African Communist Party (SACP). During this period, despite periodic attempts to revive its domestic political underground, the ANC was forced into exile by increasing state repression, which saw many of its leaders imprisoned on Robben Island. The ANC was banned by the South African government between April 1960 – shortly after the Sharpeville massacre – and February 1990. To this end, its methods and means of organisation shifted its adoption of the techniques of mass politics, and the swelling of its membership, culminated in the Defiance Campaign of civil disobedience in 1952–53. When the National Party government came to power in 1948, the ANC's central purpose became to oppose the new government's policy of institutionalised apartheid. įounded on 8 January 1912 in Bloemfontein as the South African Native National Congress, the organisation was formed to agitate, by moderate methods, for the rights of black South Africans. ![]() Cyril Ramaphosa, the incumbent national President, has served as President of the ANC since 18 December 2017. A liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid, it has governed the country since 1994, when the first post-apartheid election installed Nelson Mandela as President of South Africa. ![]() The African National Congress ( ANC) is a social-democratic political party in South Africa. ![]()
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