The ANC is heading into coalition talks with a weak hand in Gauteng’s metros and Nelson Mandela Bay, with projections putting the gap between it and the DA at about six percentage points. The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) put the ANC’s national vote share at 31.7%, with the DA trailing on 25.7% in the municipal elections. “The gap will indeed be 6%, a gamechanger,” Louw Nel, senior political analyst at Oxford Economics Africa told IOL. In the 2021 local government electio
11/05/26 • 10
The ANC is heading into coalition talks with a weak hand in Gauteng’s metros and Nelson Mandela Bay, with projections putting the gap between it and the DA at about six percentage points.
The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) put the ANC’s national vote share at 31.7%, with the DA trailing on 25.7% in the municipal elections.
“The gap will indeed be 6%, a gamechanger,” Louw Nel, senior political analyst at Oxford Economics Africa told IOL.
In the 2021 local government elections, the ANC won 45.59% of the vote and the DA 21.62%.
Nel said the early results pointed to a chastening day for the ANC, which was not expected to win an outright majority in any of the country’s eight metros.
“The picture may yet change as more votes are counted, but current projections point to disaster for the ANC,” he said.
He said the DA was set to finish first in five or possibly six metros, and was leading in Johannesburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni, as well as in Nelson Mandela Bay and Mangaung.
The ANC was ahead in Buffalo City but was set to lose its majority there for the first time, while the MK Party was leading the DA in eThekwini, where counting was slow, Nel said.
The ANC remained ahead with 32.22% of the vote, while the DA had secured 27.29% and the MK Party 6.88%, with 37% of ballots counted as of 2.12pm on Thursday.
The ANC had won outright control of 11 of the country’s 213 councils, the DA two and the MK Party one, with 37 councils hung and 161 still to be calculated.
