South Africa's African National Congress is on track for a big drop in voter support in municipal elections, results from more than two-thirds of the votes counted showed on Friday.
The results so far suggest coalition talks will decide control of major cities such as Johannesburg, extending the decline of the previously dominant party, which had to form a coalition to govern nationally after the 2024 election.
The ANC was on 32 percent of the vote, compared to 25 percent for its nearest rival, the Democratic Alliance, results from 71 percent of votes counted showed.
If those figures hold the ANC would be down about 14 percentage points from its last municipal election result in 2021, which was already its worst in history.
"(The turnout) suggests that ANC voters did not stay away – as many expected – but rather showed up and voted for alternative parties," said Louw Nel, senior political analyst at Oxford Economics Africa, who said an outcome of 32 percent would be "the party's worst nightmare coming true".
The ANC has been South Africa's largest party since it led the country out of apartheid in 1994, but its share of the vote has fallen sharply as voters have punished it for high crime and unemployment, corruption scandals and failing basic services like water and electricity.
The DA is on course to win an outright majority in Cape Town, but projections are for hung councils in other large metropolitan areas, such as Johannesburg, South Africa's biggest city, and Tshwane, home to the administrative capital Pretoria.
The outcome remains unclear in the early stages of the vote count in eThekwini, the municipality centred on Durban, where former President Jacob Zuma is hoping his party – a splinter from the ANC – can seize a majority.
Analysts have said the best option for stability in cities such as Johannesburg would be for the ANC to partner with the DA, mirroring the arrangement they have in national government. But the two are ideologically opposed on key issues such as racial redress.
(FRANCE 24 with Reuters)
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