Hope and despair after 16 years

In Sakhile township, near Balfour, Mpumalanga - the scene of violent service-delivery protests in February - youth activist Zakhele Maya, 25, said Freedom Day celebrations were an "insult" to poor people like him.

"It pains me when I am told that I must celebrate Freedom Day. We are not free. How can I be free when economic participation remains a huge problem? No one is working here. All small businesses we have attempted to establish have gone down," Maya said.

The nearest office of the Mpumalanga Growth and Development Agency, which provides loans to small businesses, is in Standerton, about 80km away.

Their nearest hospital is also in Standerton.

Though the Mpumalanga and Gauteng provincial governments recently signed an agreement allowing Sakhile residents to be treated at Heidelberg Hospital, only 20km away, Maya said this did not help much because the institution treated only those whose condition was serious.

"Once you violate basic human rights, you can't speak of freedom. We can't tune into a celebratory mood. We can't claim to be free. Access to basic services like clean water is our right, but we don't have it," he said.

"We are yet to attain freedom."

For Maya, those who celebrated Freedom Day yesterday were only celebrating the fact that South Africa is one of the most unequal societies in the world.

(This story was provided and used with permission by Timeslive.)