The pre-dawn streets of Pretoria are filled with flashing blue lights and police sirens as the city prepares for Jacob Zuma's presidential inauguration.

On our bus's TV, a Bollywood actress is rolling across an emerald lawn to a love song. Her performance is apparently being screened to entertain its usual passengers – the Indian Premier League cricketers playing their matches in South Africa instead of back home.

Today, however, the bus is filled with sleepy journalists on their way to the Union Buildings and our wait for the presidential ceremony to begin.

We are dropped off in the darkness 3km from where we are supposed to be. 

"Why?" we ask.  The officials and police shrug their shoulders. 

It is our first indication of how the day will be. 

We lug our heavy equipment across the lawns and up on to the scaffold far away from the main proceedings.  Shortly after we set up the rain starts to thunder down.

No one had thought to provide a roof for the camera crews and their equipment, so it was impossible to broadcast  because of the risk. 

Our only consolation was that the VIPs in the amphitheatre of the Union Buildings were also getting drenched as they tried to huddle together under umbrellas.

Finally, though, the sun comes out, we dry our equipment and the heads of state arrive.

Cheers from the damp but enthusiastic crowd greet Muammar Gaddafi, Robert Mugabe and the North Korean representative. 

A frail, but dignified Nelson Mandela is cheered every time his image appears on the large screens set up for the crowds.

The man who followed him as the country's leader, Thabo Mbeki, is booed with a deep angry roar. 

And then, the man himself arrives; the cheers are defeaning. Jacob Zuma is their hero. The man they came to see.

He takes the oath and the crowd goes wild as the planes from the now traditional fly-past roar overhead.

President Zuma’s speech is dignified and reconciliatory. 

He speaks of wanting to re-invigorate South African society with the values of the Mandela era.  He also speaks highly of Mbeki, his arch-rival in a battle for political power which lasted seven years. 

Zuma, the victor, then descends to the lawn where his people are gathered.

There is not a single white South African in the crowd, which is  made up almost entirely of the black poor - the power behind Zuma.  They believe he will change their lives for the better. 

He did not sing his trademark anthem ‘Umshini Wam’ or ‘Bring me my machine gun.’  He is president now, no longer a revolutionary.

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – The bikers on their Harley-Davidsons were the first surprise. They roared down the street on their slick expensive machines to the sound of bellowing exhausts and equally thunderous approval from the crowds of ANC supporters who had gathered in downtown Johannesburg to await the arrival of their hero, Jacob Zuma.

Zuma (center) jumps in the air as he celebrates on stage with supporters.

The next surprise was the skinny transvestite in the miniskirt dancing with a poster in and out among the journalists and waving to the crowd.

They were both symbolic of the diversity and freedom that exists in this country that was once ruled by the deeply conservative, right-wing values of the apartheid regime.

The bikers, in particular, symbolize the paradox of the African National Congress's hold on South African society.

Their arrival was, at the same time, both a celebration and flaunting of wealth in the face of the poor. The wealthy bikers represent the wealthy black elite that supports the ANC.

They have benefited most visibly from the organization's hold on power since the first democratic elections; the poor lining the streets and cheering them, have benefited the least – and yet, such economically different groups of people still feel bound together by a common loyalty to the ANC.

It is a paradox that the opposition parties, even the newest one, a breakaway from the ANC called Congress of the People, or COPE, seem unable to exploit.

Not all the votes are in yet, but it is clear that the ANC is set for a landslide victory.

As their president Jacob Zuma took the stage to roars of approval from his jubilant supporters, as the champagne corks popped, and the fireworks soared into the night air above the skyscrapers of downtown Johannesburg, it was clear that the ANC has lost nothing of the massive electoral power it has held since Nelson Mandela was elected as the first president of a democratic South Africa in 1994.

Still, there is a tiny chink visible in their armor. Roughly one in three South Africans did not vote for the ANC – and they are made up of all races and classes.

The ANC rules supreme, but not without some meaningful resentment left in its wake.

Still, two in every three South Africans did vote for them – and they are the ones celebrating tonight.

Zuma is the pivot of this country's political future. And yet, his broad smiles and celebratory dancing cannot hide the fact that things are not quite as simple as they might look.

His detractors probably fear him too much; while his supporters certainly believe in him too uncritically.

He has won a huge victory tonight. He rules the hearts and minds of most South Africans, but how will he govern them?

Underneath the razzmatazz and champagne, many questions remain about Zuma and how he will lead South Africa.

As one man said to me on the streets of Johannesburg tonight. "The ANC will have to work very hard. Things will not be so easy for them anymore. If they don't succeed, maybe Zuma will be thrown out like Mbeki was."

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – Standing in the queue waiting to vote, I allowed myself a few moments to reflect on some childhood memories.

Voters queue up in Soweto on Wednesday.

The polling station I am registered at is the primary school I attended in the 1960s and 1970s, and just exactly where I was standing was where, every morning and afternoon, one of the younger relatives of the Shah of Iran would roll up with his driver and bodyguard in a Rolls Royce.

He was a popular kid and I have often wondered what happened to him in the tumultuous decades that have followed since the revolution in Iran.

It was another world then, South Africa at the height of apartheid and the Shah resplendent on his magnificent throne. Both have long since disappeared into history.

Standing there in front of my old school, I thought of how much has changed in South Africa. Back in those days I didn't understand much of politics, but I did know that apartheid was wrong.

I remember watching, as a little boy, about 10 years old, with a mixture of fear and innocent outrage as a van-load of police came onto the school grounds.

They headed for the compound where the black workers who cooked our lunches and tended the grounds lived. They were looking for black people who didn't have the correct "passes" - papers that allowed them to live and work in white areas.

There wasn't much we boys could do, but I remember that some of the older kids jeered at the police as they took away two or three black men whose papers apparently weren't in order.

The brutality of apartheid is still very much alive in the collective mind of South Africa's people, so to stand in a long line of black and white people waiting patiently together to vote remains an emotional experience for most of us.

To watch South Africans vote is to see them at their best. There have been a handful of unpleasant incidents: a hundred or so pre-marked ballot papers were found in Kwa-Zulu Natal; there have been one or two angry protests, and one election official was shot in the leg by an armed robber.

Crime and corruption are big problems in the country today, as is entrenched poverty and joblessness. Many of the elite feel dismay that the country's constitution and the rule of law have been threatened by the long saga of ANC President Jacob Zuma's corruption trial; many of the country's poor, on the other hand, feel rage at how little their circumstances have changed since the ending of apartheid.

However, when we look back at the divisions that apartheid created and the rage that existed at its unfairness, it remains a miracle that South Africans are here today 15 years after the first democratic election in 1994, still voting tolerantly and peacefully, still queuing under the African sun for hours, laughing and joking with one another - and still believing that their vote can make a difference to the country they now share.

MOMBASA, Kenya - The train that had hit the container truck was a bad start to our search for dock 13 - the berthing space for the Maersk Alabama.The crumpled steel of the shipping container was crunched up across the dockyard railway lines causing a seething, angry traffic jam.

We abandoned our minibus and walked through the humid East African afternoon towards the quay. Nearby the Pirate Bar, complete with skull and crossbones motif above the window, was closed for business - a sign of the times perhaps.

The Maersk officials directed us to where the rest of the media were gathering while forklift trucks placed more shipping containers in front of us so that we would have no contact with the crew.

It was dark by the time we saw the first lights of the Maersk Alabama slowly gliding into port. Soon the tugboat was pushing its stern up against the dock, and many of the crew were standing on the decks looking somewhat bemused at the media gaggle on the dock below them.

"How did you feel when the pirates came on board?" colleague Stan Grant asked one man. "Scared," he replied. "What about Capt. Philips?" someone else shouted out. "A very brave man," another sailor said.

All the while, armed men in camouflage and flak jackets moved up and down the steel steps that connect the decks.

Later another sailor put his arm around his shipmate. "He's the real hero. He jumped one of the pirates. Took him down to the engine room and jumped him there!"

Snippets of fear, bravery, and hope shouted out into the hot African night. Fragments of a story still to be fully told. Happiness for these sailors tonight. But as one of them angrily shouted out: "There's still a man out there on a boat who may be dead."

Capt. Richard Phillips. His story is unfolding in the open seas. Invisible to the world, his fate uncertain.

"No," Hugh Masekela said to me. "Not that way, if you get your feet wrong, then everything's wrong.

Legendary musician Hugh Masekela shows CNN around Johannesburg.

It's not every day you get to do tai chi with an international music superstar, but "Bra" – "brother" Hugh, as he is known affectionately in South Africa's streets and townships, is not a man to stand on ceremony.

I was shooting an episode of "My City, My Life" on Bra Hugh and his Johannesburg and we were waiting while cameramen, Chevan Rayson and Shadley Lombard set up the lights to do a long interview with him.

"Come on," Bra Hugh said, and before I knew it, I was doing my best to follow him around the hotel room floor as he moved in a light, almost balletic series of movements. It was an impressive display for a man turning 70.

I spent three nearly full days with Bra Hugh - and they were one of the highlights of my career. With humour and unstoppable enthusiasm, he showed us his Johannesburg and Soweto, with a side trip to Witbank township where he grew up. See Hugh Masekela's Johannesburg

He took us to The Bantu Men's Social Centre, an old building in the south of downtown Johannesburg. It is an elegant brick building, erected in the 1920s and overlooked both by modern skyscrapers and the old rusting headgear of the original gold mines.

 "Here," he told us on the sidewalk. "Is where I met Miriam." (Makeba) The two of them went on to live in exile in the US and become probably South Africa's most famous musicians.

He took us through the famous old Dorkay House. Once a smart office building where the liberal white owners allowed Hugh and other black musicians to practice and gather.

Now it is a run-down slum where people live cheek-by-jowl separated by cardboard partitions. Bra Hugh looked around him sadly. "Not everything here has changed for the better," he said. "These people's lives have not changed much."

Amidst the joy of his music, there is a sadness in his conversation that echoes how so many people feel in South Africa today, which is beset by such a terrible crime rate. "Can music heal?" I asked him while he was rehearsing in his studio.

He put down his trumpet gleaming with light. "This whole nation needs therapy," he replied.

The next day we went to where it all began. The beautiful manicured gardens of what is now St. Martin's College. It was once called St. Peter's and was run by the famous Archbishop Trevor Huddleston who was so outspoken against racism in South Africa.

Bra Hugh gave us an hilarious demonstration of how, as a young new boy at the school, he had to rush around the dining hall clearing the older students' plates.

Then he took us to where Trevor Huddleston had given him his very first trumpet. It is a nondescript small office, but the memories of that small beginning echo as loudly as his famous songs.

Bra Hugh looked fondly around the school chapel. "These were the greatest years of my life," he said.

Soon, though, the cruelty of apartheid closed in on St. Peter's and on Bra Hugh. The school was closed and Bra Hugh went into exile.

It's been a long road for him from South Africa, to America, to Ghana and finally back home to Johannesburg. But the music has always been with him. "Where does your music come from?' I asked him.

He looked at me and smiled. "It's not my music, music is like air. It's there for everybody."

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – The big decision seemed to be whether to sit on the chairs - or to stand on them. The room at Luthuli House, the headquarters of the ANC was crammed so full of journalist, photographers and camera crews that it was impossible to get a view of the podium, and of ANC President Jacob Zuma speaking.

Thabo Mbeki stepped down when it was clear he had lost his party's support.

There was a nervous hesitancy about standing on the chairs - journalists may not always be the most decorous of people, but a room full of them waving pens, microphones and cameras is not something to be taken lightly.The hesitancy and mild chaos seemed to be a metaphor for what has taken place in South African politics over the last few days. The recall and subsequent resignation of President Thabo Mbeki has been a messy, emotionally brutal, unnerving affair - but it has never for one moment degenerated into the chaos that so many people feared.

Underneath the surface of events there have clearly been furious rows, old scores have been settled and deep bitternesses both revealed and newly created. The radicals in the ANC have had their way and they have forced the hand of Jacob Zuma to remove Thabo Mbeki from office swiftly and without much mercy. He said he would have preferred Thabo Mbeki to be allowed to finish his term in office. There was no point, he said, in "beating a dead snake." This is a somewhat worrying sign that Zuma seems not to be able to control the radicals in his party.

But this has been a week of high political drama - and no one could have easily predicted what would happen. And, indeed, South Africa and the ANC have come out - so far at least - the better for it. President Thabo Mbeki resigned with dignity and honor, and, on a continent where many presidents refuse ever to relinquish power, he showed that he is committed to honoring the will of his people - or at least the will of the majority party which is a similar thing.

For all the political drama of the last days, Thabo Mbeki has sent one message loud and clear across the African continent - no leader should be untouchable, and he has had the immense courage to step down when it became clear that he was no longer wanted.

In his response, Jacob Zuma made a statesmanlike speech in that crowded room. He thanked Thabo Mbeki for his contribution to South Africa's young democracy, called him a "comrade, friend and brother." That may no longer be strictly true, but between them, the two men have shown great leadership. Experts on constitutional law may well quibble over the details of what has happened, but the two men have shown that change in African leadership is possible, and that it can be done according to the rules of a democratic society.

As the news conference was winding down, one of the television sound technicians kept banging her long microphone handle against a voter education poster on the wall. "Have Your Say," it read. "Register now to vote. Shape Your Future."

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – Sophie is slicing her "Russians" - carefully - so she doesn't cut her fingers instead. Large meaty sausages called "Russians" are popular in South Africa, especially when served on top of a pile of chips buried in a large hunk of white bread, and topped with a half slice of processed cheese.It's hearty fare that goes down well with the construction workers who are building South Africa's showpiece stadium "Soccer City" just outside Johannesburg.

The Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg, South Africa, will be at the center of the 2010 World Cup.

At their noon lunchbreak they queue up outside her ramshackle restaurant, built of crooked poles, sacking and tin sheets, eager for their "Russians."

Sophie's restaurant is one of about 10 makeshift shelters from where a group of mostly women sell tea, oranges, biscuits and simple meals to the workers. Sophie lost her job at an Italian restaurant about 10 years ago and never found another. Instead, the mother of four eked out a living selling food as hawker on the sidewalks of Johannesburg.

Then, when the bulldozers started excavating for the foundations of the new stadium, she came here and set up her stall. "It's not really enough," she tells us, and then she laughs ironically. "But it's better than stealing!"

Chicken pieces sizzle in a pot over a smoky fire nearby as she smiles and cuts open yet another loaf of bread. The sound of heavy machinery moving erupts overhead as the vast cranes maneuver yet another huge and complex steel structure into place for the stadium's new roof.

Sophie's story is a story of hope. There is nothing guaranteed for her and her tiny business, but every day that the building of the hi-tech modern stadium continues is another day she can feed her children, and, if she is lucky, put a little money aside for a rainy day.

All over South Africa, there are people like Sophie. In a country where so many people live in grinding poverty, the World Cup is not only a celebration of the world's most popular sport, it is also a moment of hope, a chance, they believe, that might bring them something that they would never have had before.

PIETERMARITZBURG, South Africa - The first sign of the way things were going to be was the confusion over the media accreditation cards.

Zuma addresses his supporters at the courthouse.

"It's Lazarus, the guy with the dreads, you've got to find." one of my colleagues told me. "He's got the cards. The green ones are the important ones; the other-colored ones are not the same."

By the time I finally got hold of Lazarus, he was incredibly friendly and helpful, but he told me sadly: "I've run out of media cards. There's nothing I can do to help you." Then he hesitated for a moment. "But don't worry, you stick with me and you can come in."

We waited along with the rest of the media while Lazarus and the court officials - apparently acting on instructions from the presiding judge - argued over whether we had access to the court or not.

It was my second glimpse into the bitter political turf wars that the trial of ANC President Jacob Zuma has thrown this country.

Lazarus is part of Zuma's entourage with no official power in the court system of this country. His fight with the court security ended in a compromise.

The judge allowed us in for 10 minutes before the proceedings began. How much was Lazarus' influence; how much was the judge's sense of necessary compromise? We don't know.

The rule of law in South Africa is under threat, say both sides in the Zuma trial. The truth remains deeply murky.

Then, just outside the court proper Zuma and his entourage emerged. The cameras followed him eagerly, swirling around him in their anxiety not to miss the crucial shots - all the way into the bathroom.

Heavily-armed police prevented anyone from breaching the privacy of the urinal. He came out; and we all got more shots of him - this time actually going into court.

There is something both farcical and ominous about this saga.

It is a crucial watershed in South Africa's growth as a democratic society. What is needed more than anything is transparency.

If Zuma is indeed innocent, then that truth must be shown in front of the world's media. So, too, if he is guilty the world, and more importantly, South Africans must be able to see that for themselves.

Outside all day, about 2,000 of his supporters danced and sang to the accompaniment of taped music, including his trademark song 'Umshini wam' - 'Bring me my machine gun.'

Many had been bussed in from all over the country; many were also visibly drunk. There was something like a ragtag, failed rock concert about it.

Zuma's supporters had threatened to shut down the city. That they had not done.

And yet, it would be a mistake to dismiss them. Under the drunkenness and the simplistic, even violent, slogans lies a real desperation.

These people are the victims of the brutality of apartheid for whom the golden promise of Nelson Mandela and the lesser hopes of Thabo Mbeki have brought nothing.

They are the true heartland of this country, and they see Zuma as their savior.

BEIT BRIDGE, South Africa-Zimbabwe border – "Can you see into Zimbabwe with your equipment?," one man asks us, pointing at our satellite dish. He is bemused by our presence here, on South African soil, when the real action is taking place in Zimbabwe.  He is desperate to know what is happening back home.   We explain that we have no secret equipment, no special powers of electronic observation. Our dish is for broadcasting to Atlanta. We can only tell him what we hear from other sources.   

Slowly, the wheel turns. In the blazing heat of the African sun here on the border, the people filtering through from Zimbabwe bring news. The streets are quiet, police are on patrol, but the country is waiting. For something. They cannot be sure what, but they are willing to wait. For now, as the news of change trickles out. 

Those Zimbabweans trapped on the South African side of the border are eager for news. "What are the results?" they ask us as we stand alongside our satellite dish waiting to go live.  The parliamentary results are trickling in, showing the opposition MDC just a short way ahead of the ruline ZANU-PF. 

But it is the results of the presidential vote that every body is waiting for.  They will be the moment – both practical and symbolic - when the direction of Zimbabwe’s future is finally clear. It is the president who matters more than anyone else.  He embodies the fate of the republic.    

People often ask why Zimbabweans have been willing to suffer so much with so little overt or violent resistance. There have been relatively few street demonstrations in the last seven years of the country’s collapse. No attempt to storm the parliament as we have seen in other countries where elections have been so blatantly rigged as in Zimbabwe. The answer must lie in the memories of violence so deeply layered into the country’s past. The brutality from both sides of the liberation war, the memory of the campaign known as the Gukurahundi in the early 1980s when Robert Mugabe’s troops killed an estimated 10,000 people in a sweep against alleged dissidents in the province Matabeleland. The generations of war have left their scars. That is why Zimbabweans are willing to wait, and to hope that Robert Mugabe will go peacefully. The alternative is too terrible to contemplate. They have seen it before and do not want to see it again. 

The first signs that their hopes might be rewarded are beginning slowly to come out. The opposition is claiming that they have won over 50 percent of the presidential vote. The government mouthpiece, The Herald, has today told its readers that Mr. Mugabe may not have won the election outright. There are reports that the generals who hold the key to the country’s stability are divided. They are talking among themselves about what strategy is best to take the country forward. Change is in the air.

BEIT BRIDGE, South Africa-Zimbabwe border – Is this the beginning of the end? The rumors, reports and downright speculation are starting to fly now.

Everyone at the border post here at Beit Bridge is asking the question: what have you heard? The results of the elections seem clearer and clearer. Robert Mugabe has lost, and a generation of political leadership is about to end.

"We are just hoping for change," one man tells us. A woman sighs almost sadly, not willing yet to hope. "We’ll see," she says, shrugging her shoulders.

This is now the moment of high politics, of secret meetings, of truths denied and lies defended. What is real? What is false? Its hard to make sense of it all but at last, it seems, real change is in the air. Checking and rechecking facts, rumors with trusted sources – that’s the best we can do here on the South African border.

We are hearing that Robert Mugabe has conceded defeat - some sources say it was as early as yesterday lunchtime. The ruling ZANU PF party and the opposition MDC are in serious talks about transition. If this is all true then this is the night of the generals. They hold the future of Zimbabwe in their hands. Will they support a transition or will they be loyal to their old comrade and leader from the liberation war Robert Mugabe. Some have openly said they will not salute someone who "did not fight in the liberation war" - meaning opposition leader Morgan Tsvangarai.

This is the moment of fate. Will they accept defeat and allow the political process to move forward into the future or will they remain stubbornly wedded to the loyalties of the past?