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Mandela, background, bids farewell with hopes that Mbeki will follow him as South Africa's president RELATED VIDEO Natural sound video of soldiers voting, and election officials visiting elderly who cannont get to the polls Windows Media 28K 80K RELATED VIDEO CNN's Charlayne Hunter-Gault reports on the integration of one South African town's schools Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K  MESSAGE BOARD: South Africa elections

May 30, 1999
Web posted at: 6:58 p.m. EDT (2258 GMT)

In this story: Speech reflects on years of struggle Opposition parties jockey for 2nd place RELATED STORIES, SITES

SOWETO, South Africa (CNN) -- Buoyed by thunderous cheers from tens of thousands of supporters, South African President Nelson Mandela bid farewell Sunday and urged followers to endorse his heir in this week's national elections.

Some 80,000 African National Congress supporters packed a stadium in Soweto township outside Johannesburg in a jubilant "Thank You" rally for Mandela, which featured performances by pop singers, tribal dancers and traditional healers. The event brought to a climax the party's campaign for South Africa's second free and democratic vote since the fall of apartheid.

Raucous chants of "ANC! ANC!" greeted Mandela and his heir, Deputy President Thabo Mbeki, as they entered the stadium on a golf cart and circled the field, waving ANC flags to the crowd.

Speech reflects on years of struggle

Mandela, who plans to retire on June 16, used his speech to reflect on the decades-long anti-apartheid struggle, which he led even while jailed for 27 years.

"We have walked a long and hard path to arrive here," he said. "Our children, our brothers, our sisters, our mothers and fathers have suffered so we could claim our freedom."

He then urged supporters to turn out in heavy numbers in Wednesday's election.

Top: ANC supporters; bottom: Young ANC supporters with model rifles prepare to march at an ANC rally

"I call upon you to go to the ballot box in your millions to give President Mbeki and the ANC the mandate they need to accelerate the transformation (of the country)."

The ANC is widely expected to win the election with about 60 percent of the vote, but Mandela and Mbeki made a final effort to mobilize their supporters to ensure an overwhelming mandate.

"Despite huge gains, too many of you remain homeless, poor and illiterate. The struggle did not end five years ago," Mandela said, referring to the nation's first all-race election in 1994.

"Reversing 350 years of oppression will take more than five years," he said.

Opposition parties jockey for 2nd place

Mbeki told the crowd: "To vote for the ANC means peace, to vote for the ANC means progress, to vote for the ANC means a better life for all of our people. No other party is working on those plans except the ANC."

But elsewhere in South Africa, opposition parties were working hard to secure second place or a small foothold in the 400-seat National Assembly.

"The ANC government is failing to administer our fledgling democracy," said United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa. "This country is moving towards totalitarianism. Mr. Mbeki must know very well that the honeymoon is over."

Outside the stadium in Khayelitsha township, where Holomisa was speaking, violence broke out between supporters of the UDM and ANC. At least two ANC supporters were injured when several UDM backers opened fire with handguns.

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UDM supporters complained that the ANC backers were harassing people entering the stadium.

In the Eastern Cape stronghold of the ANC, Zulu Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi campaigned for his Inkatha Freedom Party, which is likely to see its national influence cut substantially from the 10 percent it won in 1994.

Buthelezi slammed the ANC's record on crime, which has spread under democratic rule from the black townships of apartheid into former white suburban and business areas.

"The statistics of crime are horrifying. Many of our communities are living in a state of terror," he said.

Crime is a key issue for the parties vying for second place, the Democratic Party (DP) and the New National Party (NNP) -- which, as the National Party, imposed and then dismantled apartheid in the 46 years before the 1994 surrender of white power.

DP leader Tony Leon, trying to topple the NNP as the official political opposition, said Sunday that only his mainly white party could temper the immense power of the ANC.

"Only the DP has the guts to stand up to the ANC," Leon said, to cheers from a surprisingly black-dominated crowd at a concert stadium just east of downtown Johannesburg.

Opinion polls indicate that the NNP could see its share of the vote drop from 20 percent in 1994 to as little as seven or eight percent.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

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