ing strength with harassment, detentions, torture, and assassination. But the crackdown only solidified the ANC's standing as the most viable alternative to apartheid rule. As international pressure grew in the 1980s, the South African government began secretly negotiating with Mandela and others. When F. W. de Klerk succeeded P. W. Botha as president in 1990, he freed Mandela from his 28-year-imprisonment and lifted the ban on the ANC.Three years later, talks among more than 20 organizations, but dominated by the ANC and the ruling National Party, led to a transitional government, new constitution, and plans for the country's first democratic election in April 1994. The electoral power of black South Africans, exercised for the first time, swept the ANC into a commanding legislative majority, and Nelson Mandela into the presidency.Since becoming the nation's ruling party, the ANC has faced the challenge of retaining and broadening its appeal with considerable success. Under the leadership of Nelson Mandela, the ANC has crafted an image of pragmatism over militancy that attracts liberal capitalists and continues to be popular with labor, socialists, and women's groups. Even potentially damaging testimony about Umkhonto activities before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which investigates South Africa's apartheid-era crimes, has not significantly eroded the ANC's popularity. Most analysts believe it will be victorious in the 1999 elections, when the likely ANC candidate will be Thabo Mbeki, who assumed ANC leadership in December 1997....
