Things were predicted to go badly, but they turned out to be worse: South African President Cyril Ramaphosa led the ANC to its worst electoral result since the end of apartheid, a result that threatens its survival.
Results from more than 99 percent of polling stations used in Wednesday’s election showed the ANC barely topped 40 percent of the vote, a dramatic drop from the 57.5 it received. won in 2019.
The shock result will provide a litmus test for Ramaphosa, a popular party figure who has a reputation as an excellent negotiator despite his affable demeanor, political commentators say.
The ANC, a now-divided movement that led the nation out of white minority rule and toward democracy, will remain the largest party in Parliament but will lose its majority, heralding uncharted and choppy waters for the party once led by Nelson Mandela.
He will have to forge alliances to re-elect Ramaphosa at the end of the month and remain in power, his hand forced into possible concessions with minnows he failed to beat in the elections.
But Ramaphosa will first have to persuade his party’s all-powerful but divided National Executive Committee to keep him in his post.
In 2022, his party’s lawmakers closed ranks around him in an impeachment vote following a scandal dubbed “farmgate” that nearly cost him his job, when hundreds of thousands of dollars were stolen from a sofa from his country house.
He was also re-elected president of the ANC the same year, in a race that seemed closer than expected.
“The party has to some extent rallied around him. There have been comments from very high levels saying ‘we are not going to recall Ramaphosa’,” Christopher Vandome, senior researcher at the think tank, told AFP Chatham House, based in London.
– ‘Too many skeletons’ –
The 71-year-old former trade unionist and mining boss came to power in 2018 as an anti-corruption savior following the corruption-tainted tenure of his predecessor Jacob Zuma.
Fluent in the country’s 11 official languages, he embarked on anti-apartheid activism while studying law in the 1970s and spent 11 months in solitary confinement in 1974.
Favored by Mandela as his heir, he stood by the liberation hero when he was released from prison in 1990. But the Farmgate affair dealt a major blow to the wealthy businessman’s reputation and for many, the The ANC has become synonymous with corruption.
Ramaphosa has denied any wrongdoing.
South Africans remain vexed by a prolonged water and electricity crisis that has crippled Africa’s most industrialized economy with high crime and unemployment rates.
Still, the absence of a formidable successor could keep Ramaphosa in power, said author and analyst Susan Booysen.
“The irony is that there are no real alternatives within the ANC at this stage,” she told AFP, adding that the proposed names contained “too much baggage , too many skeletons”.
“The way I am interpreting the signals at this point, Ramaphosa is surviving despite the ANC’s dismal and disastrous performance,” Booysen said.
– Calls to stop –
With no unifying candidate to succeed Ramaphosa, choosing a bed partner could be the next hurdle.
Data from the Independent Electoral Commission showed the center-right Democratic Alliance (DA) in second place with 21.71 percent, up slightly from 20.77 in 2019.
But it was not the prosecutor who dealt the decisive blow.
In third place is former president Jacob Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) with 12.6 percent, a surprise score for a party founded just a few months ago as a vehicle for the former head of state. the ANC.
The ANC had no choice but to co-opt the DA into a national coalition government, analysts say, describing it as Ramaphosa’s best bet for survival.
“The DA will want to keep Ramaphosa in power and will not want any other alternatives,” Vandome said.
Booysen agreed.
– Miraculous canvassing –
“Possible coalition partners do not offer an alternative, do not provide an alternative, charismatic, dynamic and popular president.”
The Zuma MP vowed to play hardball, ruling out any partnership negotiations if Ramaphosa remained as ANC leader.
“We will engage with the ANC but not with Cyril Ramaphosa’s ANC,” said spokesperson Nhlamulo Ndhlela.
Ramaphosa’s future remains fragile, however, threatening to follow in the footsteps of his predecessors Zuma and Thabo Mbeki, who did not complete their terms and were ousted by the ANC.
“This man has done very well for the ANC. He has led from the front,” said ANC deputy secretary-general Nomvula Mokonyane, defending Ramaphosa’s record.
“He did miraculous canvassing, crisscrossing the country. Not everyone who speculates knows the ANC.”
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