South Africa Election: ANC’s 30 years dominance ends

For the first time in three decades, South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) has lost its dominance.

It managed to secure only 40 percent of votes cast in last month’s general election, meaning it can only form a government by forming a coalition with other opposition parties.

Vote tallying from Wednesday’s poll has now entered its final stages with results from 99.53% of polling stations giving the ANC 40.21%.

The main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA), had 21.80%, uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), a new party led by former president Jacob Zuma, managed to grab 14.60%, while the far-left Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), led by former ANC youth leader Julius Malema, got 9.48%.

Final results are likely to be announced by the election commission on Sunday.

In the 2019 election, the ANC won by 57.5% but many polls suggested that it would not secure 50 percent of votes this time round.

The election results have shown that many voters seemed to have been angered by the state of joblessness, power cuts and corruption.

“We have achieved our mission: … to bring the ANC below 50%. We want to humble the ANC,” Malema told journalists.

Before the election the ANC was in control of eight out of nine provinces – but that has changed dramatically. Now the ANC looks set to retain control of just five provinces.

Gwede Mantashe, the ANC chair spoke to journalist about the process towards forming a coalition saying “We can talk to everybody and anybody.”