SOUTH AFRICA POLLS: ANC’s thumping majority ‘could fall’
South Africa’s governing African National Congress (ANC) – the party of anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela – has never got less than a thumping 62% in any national election.
That could be about to change. After a decade of economic stagnation and soaring corruption, opposition parties are threatening the ANC’s comfortable majority.
President Cyril Ramaphosa insists he can fix the ANC, and transform South Africa.
Many here are inclined to believe him. But plenty are not.
The big cities are starting to slip into the hands of the official opposition – the Democratic Alliance (DA).
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) are gaining ground too – alarming the white minority and turning South African democracy into a livelier, and often angrier space.
Anger over corruption, the faltering economy and land reform are key issues as South Africans vote in the sixth democratic election since apartheid ended 25 years ago.
The African National Congress (ANC), which led the fight against apartheid, has governed the country since 1994.
But its support has eroded as large inequalities have remained.
The centrist Democratic Alliance (DA) and left-wing Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) are providing the main challenge.
A leading South African cartoonist believes that voters have a “crappy choice”:
