Chris Hani, the South African Communist who led the ANC’s military wing, was assassinated in April 1993 before seeing the liberation he had fought for. The loss of Hani and his socialist perspective was a major blow to the new South Africa.

The assassination of Chris Hani in April 1993 was a decisive moment in South Africa’s transition to democracy. Nelson Mandela used this tragic event to pressure President F. W. De Klerk to conclude negotiations and announce a date for the elections that would bring the African National Congress (ANC) to power the following year, marking the formal end of apartheid.

Hani was born in 1942, the same year as two of Mandela’s successors as president, Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma. While Mbeki and Zuma both remain alive and politically active today, more than

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