My Vote is My Secret

1991: Nelson Mandela is released and apartheid abolished. South Africa enters a new phase in its history. After a period of euphoria, the situation again becomes tense. This is the climate in which preparations are made for the first elections on 27 April 1994 which involve for the first time all the different populations. Three filmmakers from the Direct Cinema Workshop decide to follow the event in five different places, in ex-Bophutatswana after Mangope’s portended fall, inside a hostel serving as the Inkhata party’s base on the outskirts of Johannesburg, in a garment factory where black and Cape coloured women work together, in a small country school for black farm labourers’ children, in the heart of the farmlands owned by extremist whites, and lastly, along with young Fodo, the ANC’s unequivocal spokesman in Kagiso Township. A singular vision – a long way from the traditional images – of the intense emotions roused by this historic election. “My vote is my secret, my darling” says “Little Lizzie” with a knowing wink because, in the garment factory where she works, each of the women knows who she is going to vote for.