South Africa’s watershed local elections have resulted in upsets for the ANC in key metropoles. But will the new, minority coalition regimes live up to their mandate of providing basic services?
EFF leaders Godrich Gardee, left, Julius Malema and Floyd Shivamvu brief journalists in Alexandra, near Johannesburg.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
The EFF is sending a strong message to South Africans that it wants to be known as the only political home for radical change.
President Jacob Zuma, Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa and former anti-apartheid activist Sophie de Bruyn at the unveiling of a monument to the 1956 women’s march.
GCIS
South Africa’s past tells us that, under certain conditions, women mobilise in ways that produce significant political results. But the country’s present shows how easily these gains can evaporate.
Is the ANC now just another box on the ballot?
EPA/Kevin Sutherland
Various commentators have wrongly over the last 22 years said that black people voted blindly for ANC governments. There’s no better example why the academy needs a dramatic post-colonial overhaul.
South Africa’s opposition Democratic Alliance party leader Mmusi Maimane.
EPA/Kim Ludbrook
Patronage and clientelism is slipping away from the ANC and accruing to those who pledge their political futures to the Democratic Alliance. It will have to guard against incumbency arrogance.
Not there yet: Mmusi Maimane campaigns in Johannesburg.
EPA/Kevin Sutherland
The ruling ANC has been seriously challenged by the Democratic Alliance, but South African politics is still about white privilege and black exclusion.
Supporters of South Africa’s governing ANC with a mock coffin of the opposition EFF at the ANC’s Siyanqoba rally ahead of local elections.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
South Africans are expressing disillusionment with the African National Congress. But dissatisfaction with the ruling party does not automatically translate into support for other parties.
The ANC’s top brass at the party’s rally ahead of municipal elections.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
The ANC’s waning urban vote and growing support rural is not a political trend unique to South Africa. Many of Africa’s liberation-movements-cum-governing-parties now depend on rural support for political longevity.
Voters wait their turn outside a polling station at Nkonjeni village in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The country is gearing up for local elections.
Reuters/Radu Sigheti
The opposition Democratic Alliance is hopeful that the African National Congress will fail to win a majority in three metros. This will open the door for it to rule in coalition with smaller parties.
Mmusi Maimane, leader of the opposition Democratic Alliance, woos voters in hotly-contested Nelson Mandela Bay.
Supplied by the DA
In previous elections speculation in South Africa focused on the likely size of the ruling ANC’s majority. This time the question on people’s minds is: will the ANC win or lose Nelson Mandela Bay?
Nelson Mandela laughs with journalists and performers ahead of the second 46664 concert in the Western Cape in 2005.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings
When celebrating Nelson Mandela Day, it would benefit South Africans to reflect on what the statesman’s legacy means for the nation and how they are living up to his dreams for the country.
Tshwane mayor Kgosientso Ramokgopa unsuccessfully pleads for calm with angry ANC supporters.
EPA/Ihsaan Haffejee
Some of the factors behind the riots by ANC supporters in Tshwane are not new. They include gripes within the governing party about its process for choosing mayors and divisions over Jacob Zuma.
Residents of Zandspruit, a shanty town north-west of Johannesburg, during a violent protest against the removal of illegal electricity connections.
EPAKevin Sutherland
The brouhaha over South Africa’s upcoming high-stakes municipal elections hides critically important questions about the continued relevance of local government amid growing public disaffection.
South African President Jacob Zuma, flanked by ANC Secretary-General Gwede Mantashe (left) and Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Reuters/Mike Hutchings
A key question ahead of local government elections in South Africa is whether the African National Congress will retain control of seven of the country’s eight metropolitan municipalities.
President Jacob Zuma surprised South Africans by offering to pay back public money spent on his private home.
Reuters/Nic Bothma
Jacob Zuma has backtracked on two major decisions in under two months – first after he fired his finance minister; now he says he’ll pay back public money spent on his lavish Nkandla homestead.
Mmusi Maimane was elected leader of the Democratic Alliance at the party’s federal congress on Sunday.
EPA/Kim Ludbrook
With the election of Mmusi Maimane as leader, the Democratic Alliance, like the ANC, calculated that a black rather than coloured leader is needed for victory at the national level.
Helen Zille, leader of South Africa’s leading opposition, has announced that she will step down.
Reuters/Sumaya Hisham
On the surface, 2014 appears to represent “business as usual” for the landscape of South Africa’s electoral politics. The African National Congress (ANC) has secured a fifth straight victory in the latest…
Chief Research Specialist in Democracy and Citizenship at the Human Science Research Council and a Research Fellow Centre for African Studies, University of the Free State