“The fall in support has been dramatic, in
levels never seen before,” political analyst told reporters.
Defeat in Port Elizabeth was a humiliating
blow for the ANC as the municipality is officially known as “Nelson Mandela
Bay” in tribute to its past as a hotbed of anti-apartheid activism.
With the nationwide vote count almost complete, the ANC was ahead overall but recorded its worst electoral performance since white-minority rule fell 22 years ago.
With the nationwide vote count almost complete, the ANC was ahead overall but recorded its worst electoral performance since white-minority rule fell 22 years ago.
“We are now going to do an introspective look
at ourselves … (Critics) think that we are arrogant, they think we are
self-centred… I would like to dispute that and say we are a listening
organisation.” vice president of both ANC and the
country, Cyril Ramaphosa said.
The party once headed by Nelson Mandela was
on 54 percent of the vote, sharply down from 62 percent in the last municipal
elections in 2011. On Friday, it conceded defeat to the main opposition
Democratic Alliance (DA) in Port Elizabeth, an industrial city that was a key
battleground of Wednesday’s election.
The two parties were still in a close fight
for Pretoria, the capital, and Johannesburg, the country’s economic centre,
with the ANC set to lose its outright majorities in both cities.
According to ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu,
the party had lost because the DA had managed to get its supporters to go out
and vote.
“We looked at the nature of the dispute, and
decided we should withdraw it and continue with our lives and accept that we
have lost Nelson Mandela Bay.
“We are not happy about the turn out in ANC
strongholds, we did not manage to get our people and our voters to come out in
their thousands and vote.
“That explains the phenomenon of Nelson
Mandela Bay. We have more wards there but we still lost Nelson Mandela Bay to
the DA,” said Mthembu.
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