The voting behaviour of coloureds in South Africa’s short history of democratic elections has often been treated in an off-hand or simplistic manner. Those most guilty of this abuse have been the popular mass media and political party activists. As a result, existing interpretations of coloured voting patterns in the national and provincial elections of 1994 and 1999 invent ‘traditional’ voting patterns for coloureds or even reify a homogenous coloured voting bloc. Media commentators and political party activists have often dealt with coloured voters as if they are a single, homogenous entity, with little regard for factors of class, region, religion or the impact of self-identification. For example, when the majority of coloured voters opted for the National Party (NP) in the first democratic election in 1994, interpretations of that vote – rather than interrogating it – sought to conveniently explain it through supposed ‘traditional voting patterns’ or coloureds’ supposed ‘historical affinity’ for the NP.