African National Congress faltering
- Pablo Díaz Gayoso
- Mar 3
- 4 min read
To have a little more perspective on what has happened this 2024 in South Africa we have to take a few steps back in history. On January 8, 1912, the Native National Congress of South Africa was founded, so called because, as is well known, the history of the country is strongly marked by racial division and the main objective of the party was to obtain the right to vote for the black population in one of the most racist countries in the world. The party, which in 1923 changed its name to the current African National Congress or ANC, spent 72 years in hiding because of its struggle against the apartheid regime. The history of the struggle against systemic racism is well known and even more so because of the figure of the resistance leader, Nelson Mandela. For that reason it is important to point out that the position of political hegemony that the ANC has enjoyed is explained in the long struggle for the sovereignty of 90% of the country's population, traditionally punished by the white minority.
The end of apartheid in the 1990s marked a radical change in the political system. Suffrage went from 3 million eligible citizens in the 1989 elections to 22 million in the 1994 elections. The legalization of the ANC in 1990 resulted in a supermajority in 1994 with 3 out of 4 seats in the National Assembly. Over the decades the ANC managed to maintain a comfortable majority with 10 million votes on its electoral floor that was maintained even after the death of the charismatic Mandela. However, in the last elections the ANC lost its parliamentary majority.
The elections held in May 2024 established the most fragmented National Assembly in the history of the post-apartheid era. The ANC won 159 of 400 seats, followed by the liberal Democratic Alliance (DA) with 87 and Spear of the Nation (MK) with 58, Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) with 39 and Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) with 17; followed by 13 minority parties.
The main disruptor in these elections has been Spear of the Nation (MK), which is a party founded in December 2023 by former President Jacob Zuma (2009-2018). The party was named after the ANC's paramilitary wing, uMkhonto weSizwe in Zulu. Zuma had broken with his successor at the helm of the ANC, President Cyril Ramaphosa and formed the MK party. This split from the ANC is populist anti-immigration, socially conservative and advocates the forced expropriation of white-held land without compensation. Zuma was sentenced to 15 months imprisonment and disqualification for contempt of court for refusing to appear before the Zondo Commission investigating corruption under his government. His arrest in July 2021 sparked the largest outbreak of protests in the country's recent history. It resulted in 354 deaths and more than 5,500 arrests, as well as dozens of stores burned and looted.
The ANC's electoral “defeat” is due to several factors. Crime figures have increased exponentially since the COVID-19 crisis, to the point of being the African country with the highest level of intentional crime as of 2022. During the last 3 months of 2023, around 85 people were murdered in South Africa every day; and annually between 800 to 900 minors are killed. Similarly, voters have punished the ANC for corruption, ranking 83rd out of 180 according to the Corruption Perceptions Index, tying with Kosovo or Vietnam. Added to this is the crisis in the supply of basic services such as water and electricity. This extreme situation has caused the ANC to lose more than 3.5 million voters and has had to agree on a coalition government.
The ruling coalition is formed by the ANC, AD, EFF, as well as other minority parties and has broad support in the National Assembly with 287 out of 400 seats. The opposition to the government is led by the disqualified Jacob Zuma and his party, MK. Thus, the richest country on the African continent is in a moment of transition in its political party system where the pact has prevailed over confrontation. The formation of national unity governments is nothing new in South African politics. With the end of apartheid, one was formed led by Nelson Mandela and the National Party, the hegemonic party of the previous era. At a time of serious crisis, the formation of a government of national unity can help to avoid creating problems in the short or medium term, but the union of ideologically opposed parties in the same executive is a double-edged sword. The example of Tunisia shows us that a government of national unity can degenerate into a situation of rampant voter disaffection that suffers from a crisis of lack of representation. Another recent case is that of Mario Draghi's government in Italy (2021-2022), which caused the post-fascist Fratelli D'Italia to be the only opposition force and to reach the government.
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