On the afternoon of February 11, 1990, African National Congress (ANC) head and political prisoner Nelson Mandela stepped out of the gates of Victor Verster Prison, a low-security institution in Western Cape Province, South Africa, a free man for the first time in more than a quarter of a century. His release was seen as a crushing blow for the South African policy of apartheid. For many Black South Africans, Mandela symbolized a chance to rid themselves of the racist system that had made them officially second-class citizens in their own country since the end of World War II.