JOHANNESBURG – The African National Congress’ losses in local elections worsened Saturday as results showed that the party had lost control of Pretoria, the capital, in a continuing realignment of South Africa’s post-apartheid political order.
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In a colorful rally in Soweto, once an absolute lock-in for the ANC, the charismatic opposition leader Mmusi Maimane tapped into his humble roots there.
ANC Secretary General Gwede Mantashe reportedly said in an interview with the Sunday Times that he had briefed provincial secretaries to “do everything they can” to retain all hung municipalities.
In South Africa’s largest city, Johannesburg, the ANC beat the DA but still did not manage to gain an outright majority.
A year ago it elected its first black leader, Mmusi Maimane, as it tries to shake off an image of a party mainly serving white interests.
Although the part has beaten it’s biggest opponent, the DA will need to for a coalition to secure control there. The party already runs the country’s second largest city, Cape Town, the only major South African city where blacks are in the minority among white and mixed-race residents. He said the idea that his party was a white one has been “completely shattered”.
“The ANC may just become a rural party”, said William Gumede, head of the Democracy Works Foundation think-tank.
Maimane immediately looked ahead to presidential elections.
“Municipalities have no role [to play] in macroeconomic policymaking, but such a blow to the ANC’s traditional predominance could have an impact. depending on the conclusions that ANC leaders draw”, said the agency. The 2019 campaign starts now, he said.
At the national level ANC remains the nation’s top party, but it has seen its support plunge 8 points from 2011, when it won 53.9%. Zuma’s office said Saturday that he would attend the announcement of the final election results.
Support for the ANC dropped to below 50% in all three metros in the province.
The South African economy has stagnated since the global financial crisis in 2008, and the World Bank says the country has one of the highest rates of inequality in the world.
The radical leftist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party led by Julius Malema, Zuma’s one-time protege but now arch-foe, came a distant third in the local elections, with about 10 per cent of the vote.
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However, Zuma, jailed on Robben Island with Mandela during apartheid, retains deep loyalty inside the ANC and in many rural areas, although he can not stand for a third term. The Constitutional Court recently instructed Zuma to reimburse the state £390,000.
