How did South Africa’s 1994 election end minority rule?

South Africa’s 1994 election ended minority rule by serving as the nation’s first democratic contest held under universal suffrage, effectively dismantling the apartheid system of racial segregation.21

The transition was the result of years of negotiations between Nelson Mandela of the African National Congress (ANC) and President F.W. de Klerk. These leaders reached an agreement on an interim constitution that enfranchised all citizens aged 18 and older, replacing the previous white-minority regime with a multiparty "government of national unity".23

In the April 1994 election, the ANC won nearly two-thirds of the vote, leading to Mandela’s inauguration as the country’s first Black president on May 10, 1994. This historic shift replaced a system defined by racial exclusion with a new constitutional order based on the principle of justice for all, marking the formal end of minority control over the state.243