ANC on Course to Lose Majority in South Africa’s Seismic Election

The African National Congress looked set on Thursday to lose the parliamentary majority it has held for 30 years, as partial election results suggested it would need a partner to stay in power – a first in South Africa’s post-apartheid history.
If the final results confirm the loss of its majority, the ANC will be forced to make a deal with one or more other parties to govern – a situation that could lead to political volatility in the coming weeks or months.
“There will be checks and balances on the ANC power, but the ultimate risk is that the infighting could make governance ineffective,” said Simon Harvey, head of foreign exchange analysis at Monex Europe.
With results in from 20.4 percent of polling stations, the ANC’s share of the vote in Wednesday’s election stood at 43.4 percent, with the pro-business Democratic Alliance (DA) on 24.8 percent, data from the electoral commission showed on Thursday.
The Marxist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party was on 8.8 percent, while uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), a new party led by former president Jacob Zuma, was snapping at its heels on 8.1 percent, with support concentrated in Zuma’s home province of KwaZulu-Natal.
Pollsters and two of the country’s three main broadcasters were predicting that the final results would confirm that the ANC – which won 57.5 percent of the vote in the previous election in 2019 – has lost its majority.
While early results skew towards rural areas where the ANC is relatively strong, results from urban centres where it is weaker build up later.