Johannesburg | The African National Congress party lost its majority in a historic election result on Saturday (Sunday AEST) that puts South Africa on a new political path for the first time since the end of the apartheid system of white minority rule 30 years ago.

With more than 99 per cent of votes counted, the once-dominant ANC had received just over 40 per cent in Wednesday’s parliamentary election – well short of the majority it had held since the all-race vote of 1994 that ended apartheid and brought the ANC to power under Nelson Mandela.

AP