South Africa’s ruling party the African National Congress (ANC) has lost the metropolitan area which includes the capital in its biggest election setback since it took power 22 years ago.
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While the DA’s pro-business policies are poles apart from those of the EFF, which wants to nationalisze mines and banks, the two parties may pair up to control hung councils if they follow through on their pledge not to partner with the ANC.
The DA was narrowly ahead in Tshwane, home to the capital Pretoria, while the ANC held a slim margin in the country’s economic hub of Johannesburg, in tight races that have changed hands several times during the vote count.
It was a humiliating blow for the ANC as the municipality is officially known as “Nelson Mandela Bay” in tribute to its past as a hotbed of anti-apartheid activism.
The ANC won 121 seats: 84 ward and 37 proportional representation; the DA got 104 seats: 51 ward and 53 PR seats.
South Africans should start embracing the era of coalition governments because there was little hope that individual political parties would dethrone the African National Congress (ANC) on their own, a political analyst said.
Many South Africans have criticized President Jacob Zuma and his ANC for poor economic growth, high unemployment, corruption and cronyism, a housing crisis, poor education and health systems.
The Guardian similarly reports, “If the ANC acts against Zuma, who has been tainted by corruption allegations, in the coming weeks, black urban voters will nearly certainly return to the fold”.
Nelson Mandela’s ANC swept to power amid jubilation in the first national election for all South Africans in 1994.
The Democratic Alliance has its roots in white liberal opposition to apartheid and remained a white-led party until previous year. He added that “the idea that his party was a white one has been ‘completely shattered'”.
“We are into negotiations as we speak”, said Paul Mashatile, the ANC chairman in Gauteng province, which includes Tshwane and Johannesburg. Given this reality, the DA with roughly 27% and the emerging Economic Freedom Fighters Party with a very respectable 8%, then multi-party democracy is the real victor in South Africa based on the outcome of this local election. The party so far has received 54 percent of votes across the country, its lowest percentage ever, with the Democratic Alliance getting 26 percent.
It retained support in many rural areas in a country where blacks make up 80% of the population.
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“We can’t go to bed without worrying that so many South Africans are unemployed, so many face the worst kind of poverty you can find, so many don’t have services”, he said. The Constitutional Court recently said Zuma violated the constitution and instructed the president to reimburse the state $507,000.
