South Africa election: ANC suffers worst result since 1994
Surge in support for Democratic Alliance marks a dramatic shift in country's political landscape
South Africa's Democratic Alliance (DA) is celebrating a major victory in the country's local elections after support for the ruling African National Congress (ANC) dipped sharply in urban areas.
It's the biggest electoral setback for the party since it swept to power in 1994 under Nelson Mandela's leadership.
"Many ANC supporters are switching allegiances to the DA, bolstering its attempts to attract black voters and shake off its image of a party that chiefly serves the interests of the minority white community," says Reuters.
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With 92 per cent of the votes counted, the ANC has narrowly maintained its national majority but has been defeated in the key battleground of Nelson Mandela Bay, which includes the city of Port Elizabeth.
The DA holds a narrow lead in the capital Pretoria, while the parties are currently neck and neck in the urban hub of Johannesburg. Final results are expected later today.
"The result is probably the biggest wake-up call the governing ANC has received since it ushered in democracy," the BBC's Milton Nkosi reports.
"Clearly the ANC still commands huge support across the country but that support is waning," he adds. "It can no longer take it for granted that the black majority will blindly follow it."
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High unemployment, particularly among the black youth, has heightened feelings of disillusionment with the ruling party. Numerous corruption scandals also contributed to the switch in support.
"We call this the change election because we felt that it was a referendum on Jacob Zuma as a national figure, but we also had a referendum about the future of South Africa," said DA leader Mmusi Maimane.
Analysts say the results will set alarm bells ringing in the corridors of power as the DA gears up to fight the next general election in 2019.
"Thursday's vote sent a clear message that the years when South Africa effectively operated as a one-party system are over, or drawing towards a close," says The Guardian.
The ANC has attempted to frame the disappointing result as a victory for the beleaguered party.
The South African Mail and Guardian reports that the Economic Freedom Fighters, a small radical socialist movement, could hold the balance of power after coming in third in the election.
"The possibility of a coalition could become a reality," it adds.
But with the three parties holding such starkly different political views, many question how such an arrangement could be possible. "Either way, it will be a very uncomfortable coalition for both the DA and ANC," says political analyst Coenraad Bezuidenhout.
South African elections: What is at stake in this crucial vote?
02 August
South Africans head to the polls tomorrow in a high-stakes vote that could dramatically alter the political landscape of the country for the first time since the historic post-apartheid election in 1994.
Polls suggest the ruling African National Congress (ANC) is poised to lose key cities in municipal elections widely viewed as a referendum on President Jacob Zuma's leadership.
"Local elections are normally uninteresting," political analyst Peter Attard Montalto told Reuters. "This time is very different."
Who is contesting the election?
The country's official opposition, the Democratic Alliance (DA), has billed the vote as the most important since the end of white rule more than two decades ago. Standing on a platform of "hope and change", the party promises to stamp out endemic corruption, tackle inequality and create jobs. It elected Mmusi Maimane as its first black leader last year in an attempt to shed its image as a traditionally white party.
The Economic Freedom Fighters (ECC), a radical socialist movement that splintered from the ANC and is currently the third largest party, is also set to do well tomorrow. Its proposal to strip white farmers of their land, as seen in neighbouring Zimbabwe, has struck a chord with disillusioned black voters, who feel racial inequality has not been adequately addressed under ANC rule.
Why could the ANC lose areas?
If the polls are correct, the party could lose three key areas; the financial hub of Johannesburg; Tshwane, which includes the capital Pretoria, and Nelson Mandela Bay in Port Elizabeth.
"Historically, the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality has been a stronghold of the ANC, being home to many leaders of the liberation struggle, including two post-apartheid presidents," Prince Mashele, a senior research fellow at the University of Pretoria, writes in The Conversation.
"Losing such a municipality would mean that the ANC is being rejected by its own constituency, and thus the party would need to do some serious soul-searching."
Opposition parties are drawing on widespread discontent with the ANC, seemingly never-ending corruption scandals and high unemployment levels, with local and national dynamics coming together.
"Issues such as water, roads, refuse collection, community parks now mean more than anti-apartheid struggle credentials," says the BBC's South Africa correspondent, Milton Nkosi. "People are tired of being fed the same diet of 'we liberated you from white-minority rule so keep voting for us'."
One swing voter agreed, saying: "The ANC can't win with Nelson Mandela's name forever."
What implications will it have?
The stakes are undoubtedly high, with the next general election fast approaching, Jason Burke writes in The Guardian. "Losing control of cities such as Pretoria and Johannesburg would deal an enormous blow to the prestige of the ANC and deepen already profound unease about the leadership of Zuma."
The government has been dogged by internal fighting for months, with violent clashes even breaking out in parliament, and a big loss tomorrow could herald an internal challenge against the president.
South Africa: Violent clashes threaten post-Apartheid peace
23 June
Deadly riots have rocked the South African capital of Pretoria ahead of local elections, with at least three people shot dead and scores more injured,
"South Africa is not a country unused to violence. In fact, we are mostly inured to it," Judith February writes in the Daily Maverick. "Yet, as news of burning buses and looting trickled in, this somehow felt different. Our fragile post-1994 peace seems to be faltering badly on the eve of a highly contested election."
What's been happening?
Protesters, some of them allied to the ruling African National Congress (ANC), looted shops and set buses and lorries on fire. Police struggled to contain the violence and it quickly erupted across several townships. There are fears the unrest could spread to the nearby business hub of Johannesburg.
Foreign shop-owners were targeted in the attacks, as they were during xenophobic riots last year. Attackers typically blame other African migrants for high levels of unemployment and crime.
However, this week's violence erupted in direct response to the ANC's mayoral selection for Tshwane, the district that includes Pretoria, which overruled the choice of regional branches. Thoko Didiza, a Zulu from the KwaZulu-Natal region of South Africa, was always going to be a controversial choice to stand in the August municipal elections.
"Residents say that they want someone from Pretoria to represent them and not an outsider," The Times reports.
Is this a symptom of something wider?
The conflict has not been confined to the streets of South Africa; there have been a number of violent clashes in parliament during the last few months.
President Jacob Zuma has failed to heal deep divisions in the ruling party and the upcoming election is widely seen as a referendum on his leadership, which had long been dogged by controversy.
"What we know is that this conflict did not happen overnight," says the Maverick's February. "It's a toxic mix of a political party that has lost its moorings against the backdrop of corruption and patronage and easily combustible communities, some of which have over 50 per cent unemployment rates."