When did apartheid end?

Apartheid, a system of legalised racial segregation, was introduced in South Africa by the National Party government in 1948. Under President F. W. de Klerk, the government lifted the ban on the African National Congress and released Nelson Mandela from prison in February 1990. Key apartheid laws were repealed in 1990 and 1991, and negotiations produced a new interim constitution. On 27 April 1994 South Africans of all races voted in the country’s first fully democratic election, a date now celebrated as Freedom Day. Mandela was inaugurated as president on 10 May 1994, a year after he and de Klerk shared the Nobel Peace Prize.