After the dismantling of apartheid, the party that ruled alone for 30 years has to look for support from other parties for the first time. The task is not easy.
Having led South Africa alone for 30 years Nelson Mandela the legacy ANC party loses its majority in the country’s parliament. When almost all the votes in the parliamentary elections had been counted, the party was getting about 40 percent of the votes. In the previous elections in 2019, the party’s vote share was 57.5 percent.
The main opposition party DA, whose support comes mainly from the white liberal middle class, came second in the election with just under 22 percent of the vote.
A former president convicted of corruption Jacob Zuma The MK party was getting 14.5 percent of the vote and the former ANC youth leader Julius Maleman led by the radical leftist EFF with just under 10 percent of the vote.
The ANC’s support has been eaten away by, among other things, corruption scandals.
A minority government is possible
The ANC will now have to look for government partners or support parties to stay in power. The task is not simple.
Although Zuma’s MK party is politically close to the ANC, the current president Cyril Ramaphosa and Zuma’s gaps are frozen. Zuma used to belong to the ANC.
The EFF, on the other hand, is so radical that it can hardly fit into a government with other parties. The party has demanded the nationalization of the country’s large farms and has not been ready to compromise its positions. The vast majority of farms are owned by the country’s white minority, as a result of racial upheaval.
The most natural government partner for the ANC would be the DA, but the parties have significant line differences. The DA has called for market liberalization, which is at odds with the ANC’s more leftist line. Director of the DA To Helen Zi has also hinted at the possibility of supporting the minority ANC government and agreeing with it on bills on a case-by-case basis.
In South Africa, the National Assembly elects the president, so Ramaphosa’s second term is not a foregone conclusion if a coalition government is formed in the country.
Zuma accuses fraud
Zuma accused the election results of fraud and warned the authorities not to announce the final results, citing uncertainties, for which he did not provide any evidence.
The Central Election Commission was expected to confirm the result during Sunday.
The party, which predicted a landslide victory against opinion polls, demands that the vote be reorganized.
Zuma’s words may carry weight. For example, in 2021, when he was convicted of contempt of court in connection with his corruption trial, riots broke out in which more than 350 people died.