The African National Congress is on course for a bruising result in South Africa’s local elections on Wednesday as voters go to the polls amid deep discontent over water outages, power cuts and crumbling infrastructure. The former liberation movement, which Nelson Mandela led to power in 1994 at the end of apartheid as South Africa’s first black president, is still likely to be the largest party. However, polls showed it getting less than a third of the vote, down from 45.6% at the last municipal elections in 2021 and 40.2% in 2024’s national elections.
In Kensington, a diverse Johannesburg suburb that has sustained repeated water and power outages in recent weeks, voters said they wanted to see change. The city is currently led by Dada Morero, the ANC mayor, in coalition with the far-left Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) and the rightwing populist Patriotic Alliance (PA). Terrence Pieters, a retired boilermaker, said: “The infrastructure in Johannesburg is shot.” He declined to say which party he voted for, other than it was “one of the offshoots of the DA”.
It’s going to be a circus, it’s going to be a coalition.” Vote fragmentation means the ANC could still end up leading many city coalition governments while losing control of others. Unstable coalitions are already a feature of many of South Africa’s 257 municipalities, and analysts point to their high turnover as a major reason for poor service delivery. Johannesburg, a city of 4.8 million people that has faced water shortages for more than a week, has had 10 mayors in as many years.
The neighbouring municipality of Ekurhuleni has had three mayors since 2021. To the north, in Tshwane, which contains the capital, Pretoria, the mayoralty has rotated between parties four times since 2020. In October, more than 800 people contracted a gastrointestinal illness from contaminated water in Bronkhorstspruit, in east Tshwane.
The ANC’s national leadership is open to working with the DA in Gauteng, according to South African media, mirroring the government of national unity, where the two parties are the largest in the national coalition. However, local ANC leaders are reportedly not in favour of a DA tie-up. Currently, the ANC governs in various coalitions across the province’s three metros, including under an ActionSA mayor in Tshwane.
In Johannesburg, the DA’s Helen Zille has led a spirited campaign, with viral stunts including the 75-year-old snorkelling in a pothole and kayaking along a flooded street. However, the former Cape Town mayor is still viewed with suspicion by many, especially black voters, due to controversial past comments appearing to excuse colonialism. Some voters also point to soaring housing costs in Cape Town, which has been run by the DA since 2006, as a reason not to vote for Zille.
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