• Voters queue in Bekkersdal township in May last year. Picture: AFP

  • A voter is marked by an election official in Attridgeville, Pretoria, earlier this month. Picture: GCIS

  • People brave the early-morning Cape Town chill to vote in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, on Wednesday. Picture: TREVOR SAMSON

  • Voting gets underway at the Pretoria City Hall voting station in Pretoria on Wednesday. Picture: GCIS

  • Voters queue at the Rakgatla High School voting station in Marikana, where residents reported waiting in line for more than four hours. Photo: AFP/Skyler Reid

  • South African National Defence Force soldiers patrol the streets as voting takes place in Bekkersdal on Wednesday. Picture: PUXLEY MAKGATHO

  • Children play at a building in Bekkersdal as voting takes place on Wednesday. Picture: PUXLEY MAKGATHO

  • Residents stand in a queue to casting their vote at the Mahlogonolo Ledwaba Centre in Attridgeville, Pretoria, on Wednesday. Picture: GCIS

  • Residents of Diepsloot came to cast their votes at the Diepsloot community centre on Wednesday. Picture: GCIS

  • A woman poses for a photograph at the Steve Tshwete Secondary School voting station in Oliven, Johannesburg, during the election earlier this month. Picture: GCIS

  • Voters wearing Democratic Alliance T-shirts wait to cast their vote in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, on May 7. Picture: TREVOR SAMSON

  • President Jacob Zuma, left, casts his vote at Ntolwane Primary School in Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal, on Wednesday. Picture: GCIS

  • Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe casts his vote at the Colbyn voting station in Pretoria on Wednesday. Picture: GCIS

  • African National Congress national chairwoman Baleka Mbete casts her vote at Berario Community Centre in Northcliff, Johannesburg, on Wednesday. Picture: GCIS

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SOUTH Africans go to the polls on Wednesday to vote in the country’s fifth national democratic election.

According to the Electoral Commission of South Africa, 25.3-million of about 31-million South Africans who are eligible to vote had registered to vote.

In depth: Election 2014

Election poll 2014News, views and analysis of South Africa's national and provincial elections on May 7 2014

The 2014 election, which takes place against a backdrop of service-delivery protests across the country and protracted labour strife, is possibly South Africa's most highly contested since the first democratic election on April 27, 1994.