The African National Congress has been in power in South Africa for twenty years. In the run-up to the May 7 election, it says it has a “good story to tell” about its performance over that period. This is the first of two reports evaluating key claims.
Kgalema Motlanthe has claimed that the percentage of households with children that have gone hungry “at some point” has fallen from “over 25%” in 1994 to 6.5% in 2012. The claim is incorrect.
An official curriculum vitae for Thandi Modise, the controversial Premier of South Africa’s North West province, contains a number of false claims and glaring factual inaccuracies, Africa Check has discovered.
A Facebook post that went viral in 2013 made a series of claims about how South Africa has changed since 1994. Africa Check tested the evidence.
President Jacob Zuma claimed recently that more than a million South African households have been connected to electricity over the past five years. But, as Africa Check found, the source for the claim is unclear and numbers provided by different government departments vary significantly.
The ANC has claimed that 36-million South Africans have been given access to sanitation since 1994. If it were true, it would be a staggering achievement. But the claim is exaggerated.
The leader of the African National Congress in South Africa’s Western Cape Province has claimed that 98% of landowners in the city of Cape Town are white and “people in the Jewish community”. But, as Africa Check discovered, South African property records only listed the race of owners prior to 1994 and not their religion.
The department of basic education claims to be replacing a “mud school” a week in South Africa’s impoverished Eastern Cape province. At face value, it would seem to be an impressive accomplishment. But as Africa Check discovered, the claims involve a heavy dose of spin.
In recent months a South African marketing research company has peppered local media outlets with headline-grabbing releases detailing the findings of their “cellphone” surveys of South African youth. The surveys do not provide true representation of youth opinion across the country yet much media coverage has been unquestioning.
All sides agree one thing: gun crime in South Africa is too high. But the white population of South Africa has no greater reason than others to fear gun crime, and evidence suggests that owning guns may not always make the owners, and their visitors, safer. It may do the reverse.