Democratic Alliance gives ruling ANC worst time since apartheid

South Africa’s ruling party has lost control of the administrative capital Pretoria.

The ANC has also lost Nelson Mandela Bay metropolitan area in the Eastern Cape, which includes Port Elizabeth, to the DA.

During the municipal elections nearly every local government seat was up for grabs, including urban powerhouses such as Johannesburg as well as tiny municipalities.

A more radical opposition party, the Economic Freedom Fighters, contested the local elections for the first time and received 8 per cent of the vote nationwide after promising measures to help the poor.

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. 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 DA was founded by some of the more liberal figures in the now defunct National Party, which created apartheid in 1948.

The DA, which past year elected its first black leader, Mmusi Maimane, as part of its efforts to shake off its image as a party that mainly serves white interests, has retained control of Cape Town, which it has held since 2006.

The ANC chairman in Gauteng province, which includes both Tshwane and Johannesburg, said his party was also seeking to form a coalition to govern both municipalities, adding there was likely to be no outright victor in either of the urban areas. And it will likely embolden party rivals to challenge embattled President Jacob Zuma ahead of the 2019 elections.

ANC officials in the area, however, said they were lodging a complaint about 500 dumped ballot papers found there with votes marked for the party.

“Now we’ve got to do everything in our power to make sure where we govern we govern well”, said Maimane, who declared that his party had won in Tshwane, well before the final tally.

“It’s quite clear that our people, our traditional supporters, are still with us but maybe not too many people came out to vote so we need to go back and find out why”.

Among the EFF’s basket of expectations would be the demand that the governing party remove Zuma as South Africa’s president with immediate effect – a demand that would stall any future talks as this would have to be processed through the ANC’s senior structures.

Revelations that upgrades to President Jacob Zuma’s private home were funded with vast sums of public money caused an outcry. Zuma’s spokesman was unavailable to comment.

The election outcome suggests work is needed before South Africa’s general election in 2019. Of course, it could well be that the ANC reinvigorates itself by focusing on rooting out individuals that appear to value personal wealth – and political cronyism – at the expense of the masses.

The rape case has caused political damage to Zuma, particularly because he conceded that he had had unprotected sex with the woman, despite knowing that she was infected with HIV.

For millions of South Africans who voted for those other organizations, the answer is plenty.