Thirty years after the African National Congress took control of South Africa in the country’s first multi-racial elections, recent polling suggests that the party of Nelson Mandela may not receive a majority of parliamentary seats in next week’s election.
The ANC has had the advantage of never having to form a coalition government throughout its leadership tenure. The political party received 62 percent of the vote in 1994, 66 percent in 1999, 70 percent in 2004, 65 percent in 2009, 62 percent in 2014, and is currently governing with a 57 percent mandate.
Recent polls, although some with as much as one-third undecided, suggest that their support has fallen to as low as 40 percent.
While always portraying themselves as a liberating force for the nation’s indigenous African citizens, the ANC has consistently failed to address the rampant corruption, violent crime, unemployment, incompetent civil service, failing educational system, and housing shortages that have persisted for the last three decades.
Observers have noted that large losses for the ANC may force the party leadership to form a government with the antisemitic, communist, and black nationalist Economic Freedom Fighters, a situation that would likely cause great concern for the country’s non-black, Jewish, and business communities.
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