The African National Congress, the party of Ntate Nelson Mandela, has been hit by its worst ever election result since apartheid ended 30 years ago;
With results from 99% of voting districts declared the ANC has 40%;
This is a steep fall since the last election in 2019 when it got 57%;
This means it will have to share power with one or more parties;
ANC leaders are preparing for complex coalition talks;
The centre-right Democratic Alliance (DA) remains the second-largest party with 22%;
The new MK party, led by ex-President Jacob Zuma, is in third place with 15%. Zuma is the biggest winner in the election as his new party’s good performance has essentially guaranteed the massive drop in support for the ANC;
Zuma’s MK replaces the radical EFF as the third largest party after the latter’s share of the vote fell to 9%;
The distribution of seats in the 400-member National Assembly will be proportionate to the vote share;
Just like Lesotho did in 2012, South Africa will now begin its own era of coalition politics;
The centre right DA has signalled it is willing to enter a coalition with the ANC. Analysts say that is the best possible coalition arrangement not only for South Africa, but the entire Southern African Development Community (SADC) region;
A “doomsday” leftist coalition between the EFF and President Zuma’s MK party will likely see the Rand collapse, the flight of investors and demise of the South African economy. That will have a devastating impact on Lesotho as our own Loti is pegged to the Rand and we are essentially a satellite economy of South Africa;
This “doomsday” coalition scenario is feared because of the ultra-leftist policies of the MK and EFF which demand the nationalization of key economic sectors like banking, mining and confiscation of white land without compensation. Such ultra-leftist policies have failed wherever they have been tried in places like Cuba, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, North Korea etc;
Summary of the South African Elections
