Country Information

Southern Africa.

1,219,090 sq km (470,693 sq miles).

48,601,098 (2013).

39.9 per sq km.

Cape Town (legislative); Pretoria (executive); Bloemfontein (judicial).

Republic. Gained partial independence from the UK in 1910 and was declared a republic in 1961. After the downfall of apartheid the first one-man-one vote elections were held in 1994.

The Republic of South Africa fills the southern tip of the continent and is lapped by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the Indian Ocean to the east, and a swirling mixture of the two at the very tip. It totally encloses the independent kingdom of Lesotho, and is bordered by Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Swaziland to the north.

A vast, interior plateau has sharp escarpments that rise above the lowland plains. Mountainous regions include the Drakensberg and Magaliesberg.

The west coast is arid, while the south and southeast coasts are semi-arid, with vegetation fringed by sandy beaches and rocky coves. In contrast, the subtropical northeast has lush wetlands and coastal forests. The wildlife viewing areas are scattered throughout the country, with the famous Kruger National Park so vast that it encloses a wide variety of eco-systems.

Of its nine provinces, Gauteng, which houses Johannesburg and Pretoria in the northeast, is the smallest and most densely populated. The Northern Cape is the largest province covering between a third and quarter of the country, but containing only a tiny percentage of the population in this territory of desert and semi-desert wilderness.

The official languages are Afrikaans, English, isiNdebele, isiXhosa, isiZulu, Sepedi, Sesotho, Setswana, Siswati, Tshivenda and Xitsonga.

Around two thirds of South Africans are Christian of some form including Catholics, Anglicans, Dutch Reformed or African independent churches. Many Africans believe in traditional healers called sangomas, who give readings âEuro“ including throwing the bones âEuro“ and provide spiritual and emotional counselling and dispense African traditional medicines or muti. There are also significant Hindu, Muslim and Jewish communities. Johannesburg has areas that the descendents of former immigrants have made their own, including Fordsburg for the Indian community and Chinatown in Cyrildene.

GMT + 2.

South Africa’s biggest cities are very westernised and hold few cultural surprises for Europeans. Handshaking is the usual form of greeting, sometimes in a more elaborate African handshake that foreigners will pick up readily. Casual wear is widely acceptable, especially in less formal Cape Town. Smoking is prohibited in public buildings and on public transport. The presence of so many diverse ethnic backgrounds certainly adds some spice outside of the main business centres. Rural areas most likely to be visited by travellers include Zulu land in KwaZulu Natal where communities are based in small traditional villages with round huts (rondevals) and a few hustling, bustling relatively poor towns.

In Durban you’ll be entertained by beach-front Zulu dancers wearing full animal skin tribal regalia. A more modern form of culture is the now commercialised Gum Boot dance, performed in wellingtons and mining outfits and developed in men’s only mining hostels when entertainment was scarce.

220/230 volts AC, 50Hz. Plugs have three fat round pins.

President Jacob Zuma since 2009.

President Jacob Zuma since 2009.

Colonialism was taken to extremes in South Africa, with a white minority enforcing the system of Apartheid to subjugate the black majority. Decades of internal activism re-enforced by external sanctions eventually broke the system. The dismantling of Apartheid officially began in 1990 after negotiations between President FW De Klerk and jailed African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela.

The first historic one-man-one-vote elections in 1994 swept the ANC to power and Mandela became the country's iconic president. Mandela earned enormous international respect for leading South Africa into democracy with relatively little bloodshed.

Since his retirement the political stage has lacked such leadership or charisma, with his successor Thabo Mbeki doing little to combat the twin ravages of violent crime and an AIDS pandemic.

ANC leader Jacob Zuma was elected in April 2009 in a presidency so far more noteworthy for Zuma's headline-hitting personal life than for effective governance.

The legacy of Apartheid still shapes much about the country, its economy, education system, its workforce and the massively unequal division of wealth, and racial tension still occasionally flares up more than 16 years after the official introduction of democracy.