The committee responsible for this new composition included Anna Bender, Elize Botha, Richard Cock, Dolf Havemann (Secretary), Mzilikazi Khumalo (chairman), Masizi Kunene, John Lenake, Fatima Meer, Khabi Mngoma, Wally Serote, Johan de Villiers, and Jeanne Zaidel-Rudolph.

From the late 1940s to the early 1990s, South Africa was governed by a system known as apartheid, a widely condemned system of institutionalized racial segregation and discrimination that was based on white supremacy and the repression of the black majority for the benefit of the politically and economically dominant Afrikaner minority and other whites.

"Die Stem" is a poem written by C. J. Langenhoven in 1918 and was set to music by Marthinus Lourens de Villiers in 1921.

The South African government adopted both songs as dual national anthems in 1994, when they were performed at Nelson Mandela's inauguration.

[11] For the 1995 Rugby World Cup, Morné du Plessis suggested that the Springboks learn all the words of "Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika", and "they did so with great feeling", according to their instructor Anne Munnik.

Thus, lines from the apartheid-era national anthem's first stanza referencing the Voortrekkers' Great Trek were omitted, as "this was the experience of only one section of" South African society.

[14] As such, the English portion of the new South African national anthem was the one that had its lyrics changed from the previous version.

[14] In recent years, the South African national anthem has come under criticism for its Afrikaans verse as it was originally part of the national anthem of South Africa that was used during the apartheid era,[16] with some such as the Economic Freedom Fighters calling for the verse to be removed, supposedly because of this connection.