ANC the big winner in by-elections

Party secures 64 of 95 wards contested across all provinces

The ANC on Thursday hailed its runaway by-election victories in the Eastern Cape as confirmation it is ready to win 2021‘s local government elections.

The party was declared winner of the 2020 by-elections when it secured 64 wards out 95 contested across the country, winning six new ones and only losing two in 55 municipalities in all nine provinces.

The party‘s biggest opposition, the DA, came out the biggest loser with nine of its wards slipping out of its control, retaining 14, and winning two new wards.

The loss by the DA is consistent with its dismal performance in last year‘s general elections, where its share of the vote fell from 30.78% in 2014 to 27.45% a performance which sent the party into internal turmoil, leading to its then leader Mmusi Maimane and chair Athol Trollip resigning.

The by-election victory will come as a boost to the ANC, which went into election mode under a cloud of corruption related to Covid-19 procurement and the stealing of food parcels by some of its councillors.

In the Eastern Cape, the ANC won 18 of the 19 contested wards in the Eastern Cape.

Explaining the high voter turnout for the party, provincial ANC spokesperson Loyiso Magqashela said the citizens of the province still had confidence in the party despite the challenges it faced.

“We have got our fair share of intra-political challenges, but out of the challenges within the organisations, and perception out there of the corrupt element that some of our leaders are accused of, shows that the ANC is under serious attack.”

However, the voters were more concerned about service delivery issues than corruption, Magqashela said.

When we go to these campaigns “and did door-to-door programmes, we did not hear anyone complain, but people are concerned about what really matters to them.

“That tells us that people have a love for the ANC.”

Magqashela attributed the win to a selection of ward councillors through internal organisational processes.

“Our approach in identifying candidates helped to our advantage. Afterwards we subject the candidate to the will of the community and not the ANC to allow the community to have a say in the leadership.

” The party only lost ward 11 in the Joe Gqabi region to the DA.

“We are very much impressed by the performance displayed by the organisation during these by-elections especially now that we are dealing with Covid-19 where you would not really get that confident an electorate.

But we are also disappointed “that we have lost one out of the 19 because that was also our ward but we have a chance to rectify that come 2021.”

The party will be using the outcome as a baseline for the 2021 local government elections, Magqashela said.

In a statement on Thursday, IEC vice-chair Janet Love said the elections ran smoothly, with only minor disruptions in Johannesburg and Amahlathi local municipality. She said the average turnout was 37.83%, compared with an average of 38.73% for by-elections over the past four years.

The highest turnout recorded “was 75.29%, which was recorded in ward 4 of the Port St Johns municipality in the Eastern Cape.”

The by-elections were contested by 40 parties, with a total of 444 candidates, including 19 independent candidates.

Provincial political analyst Ongama Mtimka said the victory could not be used as a baseline for next year s elections.

The by-elections are generally “keepers unless there is an upset like the UDM did sometime before 2016 in Nelson Mandela Bay. Other than that it is generally a continuation of the elections.

These were the strongholds “of the ANC. The trend can help us explain some interesting things about voter behaviour. These are signs and impressions of what may come, but are not conclusive for the general elections because the turnout is very low.”