South Africans on Wednesday voted in the most competitive election since the end of apartheid, with opinion polls suggesting the African National Congress, ANC, could lose its parliamentary majority after 30 years in government.
Queues formed in the main cities of Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban as polling got underway around 7 a.m. , with lines also seen in the morning cold in townships on the outskirts of cities and in rural areas.
“I want to see change in South Africa,” said Bongile Mkunqa, an unemployed man who came to vote in Langa, the oldest Black township in Cape Town.
“It is a long time the ANC is in charge in the country, but it didn’t change,” he added.
Voters at polling stations across the country cited high rates of unemployment and crime, frequent power blackouts and corruption in ANC ranks as reasons why they would vote for opposition parties, but others were wary of change.
Pensioner Charles Louw, 62, said he would remain loyal to the ANC as he distrusted the promises made by opposition parties to create jobs, end power cuts or crack down on crime.
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“The ANC have been trying to do it, they are there, they have got experience, they know how to accommodate everything. But the new parties, where will they start?” he said after voting in Alexandra, a sprawling township east of Johannesburg.
Then led by Nelson Mandela, the ANC swept to power in South Africa’s first multi-racial election in 1994 and has won a majority in national elections held every five years since then, though its share of the vote has gradually declined.
If it falls short of 50% this time, the ANC will have to make a deal with one or more smaller parties to govern – uncharted and potentially choppy waters for a young democracy that has so far been dominated by a single party.
Voters are electing provincial assemblies in each of the country’s nine provinces, and a new national parliament which will then choose the next president.
With the ANC still on course to win the largest share of the vote, its leader President Cyril Ramaphosa is likely to remain in office.
More than 27 million South Africans are registered to vote at more than 23,000 polling stations where voting will continue until 9 p.m.
“If early indications are anything to go by, we may match or just surpass the 66% voter turnout (seen in the last election in 2019),” said Masego Sheburi, a senior official at the electoral commission, at a briefing about six hours into the election.
Turnout has steadily fallen since the start of the democratic era and is one of the key variables this time.
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