the world saw long lines of Africans waiting patiently, often for many
hours, to get to the polling stations and cast their votes. For former vote-
less people, it was the experience of a lifetime; for some it took on the
aura of a religious experience. Nevertheless, by the standards of western
democracies, it was seriously flawed, and not only in KwaZulu, where the
IFP had only a week to prepare. That was not surprising. There was no
voters' roll or accurate census of African areas, and there was a huge
shortage of buildings suitable as polling stations and people qualified to
operate them. Many areas were so completely dominated by one party
that rivals had not been able to campaign there and people were too scared
to vote against the tide. Although the IEC itself was not well led and con-
tained many inexperienced and inefficient workers, it did try to overcome
these deficiencies.Inevitably, though, there was much confusion as nearly
twenty million people (estimated to be 86 percent of the electorate), many
of them illiterate, sought to vote. In many cases, people voted more than
once, pirate polling stations were set up, underage youths were permitted
to vote, ballot papers did not arrive in time, partisan officials stuffed bal-