By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The African National Congress (ANC) is currently holding its National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting, its highest decision making body as the party looks set to lose the parliamentary majority it has held for 30 years since the end of apartheid.
With more than 65% of votes counted across the country’s nine provinces, had received just under 42% of the national vote in Wednesday’s election, according to the partial results.
The ANC was still widely expected to be the biggest party, but its being so far off 50% at this stage of an election was unprecedented, analysts said.
The IEC has said the final results will be announced by Sunday, possibly sooner. While all the major parties indicated they would wait for those final numbers before entering any coalition talks, the country’s focus now was firmly on whom the ANC might approach to jointly govern Africa’s most developed economy if it loses its majority.
The ANC deputy secretary general Nomvula Mokonyane said the leadership will meet on Friday afternoon to discuss a way forward.
“We are meeting with the ANC today, and there will be consultations out of the meeting of the officials and by tomorrow (Saturday), we will be able to brief the people of South Africa.
She added: “We are fine, we are fine. What is of importance is to also note that we are above what was predicted earlier on in terms of the ANC.”
“When we went to these elections, the predictions were that the ANC would get 36%.”
Even though the ANC is likely to need a coalition partner to remain in power, Mokonyane remains confident that the party’s results will improve once all the votes have been tallied.
Democratic Alliance leader John Steenhuisen said he was open to working with the ANC, although he would have to first speak with a group of other smaller parties with which he has a preelection agreement. He said the possibility of the country’s biggest political shift in 30 years “opens up a whole new universe for politics in South Africa and to start building something better for the people of South Africa.”
Steenhuisen had said on election day: “All bets are off in this election. We’re heading into coalition country.”
Meanwhile South African Rainbow Alliance (SARA) leader Colleen Makhubele has blamed a lack of media coverage for the party’s poor performance during the 2024 general elections.
Makhubele led a coalition of smaller parties, but by Friday afternoon, they had only managed 0.03% of the national vote.
She claimed SARA’s struggles could also be attributed to “sabotage” by bigger political parties, such as the ANC.
“We can see the party, and we have seen it even before the elections, where our party members were offered money to join this party.
“If you look at the top five or top ten, you can just imagine how much money was spent. Even the new parties that are doing well fighting for one seat, Bosa and RISE (Mzansi), you can see how much money was spent.
Coalition negotiations could depend on how far the ANC falls short of a majority in the final results, if indeed it remains under 50%. If it’s just short of a majority, it could approach several smaller parties to get past 50%. If it is some way off — as it was in the latest results — it might have to work with one of those three main opposition parties. They have very different ideologies.