Enthusiastic South Africans queued for hours to vote in their third post-apartheid election yesterday, with the African National Congress expected to return to power in a landslide.

The ANC looked certain to capitalise on its enduring appeal as the party that ended white rule and the only questions were the size of its victory and whether it could make a clean sweep of all nine provinces.

Long queues snaked from many of the 17,000 polling stations through the day, a confirmation that the 20 million registered voters still cherish the right to vote 10 years after Nelson Mandela first swept the ANC to power in multiracial elections.

"We hear that some people were at (polling) stations at five o'clock. Both young and old - it's fantastic," said Brigalia Bam, head of the Independent Electoral Commission.

"This is what we fought for," declared Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, former wife of Mandela, as she voted in Johannesburg's Soweto black township.

"We are absolutely certain of an enormous victory," added Ms Madikizela-Mandela, a popular ANC figure.

One Cape Town voting line meandered some three kilometre through city blocks. Streets were largely clear of traffic after authorities declared polling day a national holiday.

At one of six polling stations in Diepsloot, a Johannesburg ghetto of makeshift shacks and small houses, black voters waited patiently in a queue nearly two kilometres long.

Andrew, 27, was at the front of the queue after waiting since 4 a.m. "It's very important to vote because I remember where I came from," he said.

Voters were casting two ballots each, one for the national parliament and one for provincial assemblies. No major incidents were reported, including in the volatile KwaZulu-Natal Province. A close contest between the ANC and the Zulu-based Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) had raised fears of violence in the province, where 20,000 police were deployed.

President Thabo Mbeki, set to win a second five-year term, and Mr Mandela voted early.