South Africa’s ruling ANC on track to lose majority for the first time

Results could still swing slightly as votes from large metropolitan areas were still coming in. A final tally is expected Saturday.

The White-led, liberal Democratic Alliance took just under 23 percent of the vote, suggesting that gaffes by party leaders had dented its promotion of itself as the party of good governance. DA leader John Steenhuisen, whose party looks set to hold on to the Western Cape around Cape Town, said the result was “a great day for democracy.”

“People have now chosen to punish a government that has failed to deliver by removing their majority,” he said. “There are choppy waters ahead, but for the first time in 30 years, no single party has a majority. As a democrat, it delights me from my head to my toes.”

The election’s real winner, in third place with 12 percent of the vote, was the new uMkhonto we Sizwe Party (MK) — meaning “Spear of the Nation” — which was founded last year as a vehicle for former president Jacob Zuma, once an ANC stalwart.

Although Zuma heads the MK Party, a court disqualified him from serving in Parliament after he was given a 15-month jail sentence for contempt of court in 2021. The constitution bars anyone with a prison sentence of 12 months or longer from holding a parliamentary seat.

MK is named after the ANC’s military wing during the apartheid years, and represents the ANC’s Zulu tribal faction. Zuma, who is Zulu, headed the ANC while president from 2009 until corruption allegations force him he to step down in 2018. He was succeeded by Ramaphosa.

Political analyst and author Mpumelelo Mkhabela said there appeared to be an internal battle over who should lead the MK Party, Zuma or founder Jabulani Khumalo.

“It’s a party that has no culture of any leadership, elective conference. They have no culture of decision-making — everything centers around the personality of Jacob Zuma,” Mkhabela said. It is still unclear whether that cult of personality could deliver effective decision-making, he said.

MK’s strong showing came “from an angle we didn’t really expect,” Gwede Mantashe, the ANC national chairman, told the media Thursday. “That was the biggest surprise of these elections.”

The populist Economic Freedom Fighters party, whose supporters often wear red berets and advocate the enforced nationalization of mines and White-owned farms, came in fourth with 9.5 percent of the vote. Its founder, Julius Malema, was head of the ANC Youth League before he split off in 2011.

The national electoral commission says voter turnout was nearly 60 percent, just under the two-thirds turnout in the 2019 election when the ANC took 57 percent of the vote, its previous worst performance.

The ANC’s failure to stamp out rampant corruption in its ranks, or tackle high unemployment, violent crime and deteriorating services, including chronic electricity blackouts, has sharply eroded its support, which has been steadily declining for years.

Any of the big parties could get the ANC over the 50 percent mark, but all are likely to demand substantial concessions and influence over policy. Nationally, a partnership with the DA might mean a swing to the right on economic policy, and possibly cooler relations with Russia, a long-standing ally of the ANC during its liberation struggle.

But a partnership with either MK or the EFF would probably demand a swing to the left on economic policies and closer ties with Russia and China.

South Africa is also leading global condemnation of Israel by spearheading the case against it at the International Criminal Court, but that is unlikely to be affected by the election.