However, despite being in prime position, the ANC risks losing control of some major urban areas, like the capital city Pretoria where its Democratic Alliance (DA) rival polled nearly 50 percent of the vote, while the ruling party won just 38.76 percent.
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The African National Congress – which ended white-minority rule when it won power in the first democratic national election in 1994 – held a big lead in the overall count in nationwide municipal elections.
Gary van Staden, analyst with NKC African Economics said, “national issues, national policy failures, featured significantly in voter decisions on Wednesday”.
It could be set to become the king-maker as the politics of coalitions takes root in South Africa, for example in cities like Johannesburg and Pretoria where it looks as though no party will win an outright majority.
It seems that urban black voters in particular – fed up with the ruling party and the country’s president Jacob Zuma, but distrustful of an opposition considered to represent the interests of a small and predominantly white minority – simply stayed away.
The best example is in the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality where the ANC is lagging behind in a city (Port Elizabeth) which has a rich history of anti-apartheid struggle.
But neck-and-neck races between the ANC and DA in Johannesburg and Tshwane mean the EFF could be needed for coalitions there.
Mmusi Maimane, the DA leader, called the results a “vote for change”.
With more than 1.3 million votes counted across the country on Wednesday night, the ANC held about 51 per cent of the vote, while the opposition Democratic Alliance had about 34 per cent.
The DA also boosted its majority in Cape Town to more than two-thirds, a resounding vote of confidence in its ability to govern.
With 85% of the votes in, the ANC trails its main rival, the Democratic Alliance, in the cities of Port Elizabeth and Cape Town.
“I’m quite glad to announce the fact that, here in the city of Tshwane, by all of our current projections, certainly we will be the largest party”, Maimane said, although the two parties were by that point neck and neck there, at just over 42 percent each, with 82 percent of the votes counted.
Siyasanga Sijadu, a representative of Cope, an ANC breakaway party which had votes in its favour among the ballots, said elections should be run free and fairly.
Economic difficulties associated with a downturn in world trade have exacerbated problems of unemployment and mass immigration from even harder-hit countries in the region. The South African economy has stagnated since the global financial crisis in 2008.
If this happens, it would be a major blow to the ANC’s prestige, putting greater pressure on the party’s insiders to challenge Mr. Zuma’s leadership.
“In the case of Tshwane and Johannesburg the ANC will be the biggest party-but very significantly, it will fall below 50 percent, so we are looking at a major setback”, he said. The Constitutional Court recently said Zuma violated the constitution, and it instructed the president to reimburse the state for $507,000.
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The ANC before the election said it remained the most powerful political force in the country and pointed to the strides it had made in improving the lives of South Africans.
