South Africa’s ANC Faces Crucial Test as Local Elections Expose Party Rivalries and Generational Shift
South Africa’s African National Congress (ANC) is heading into the 2026 local government elections under growing pressure, with internal divisions, defections and changing voter attitudes threatening to further weaken the party’s long-standing political dominance.
The elections are expected to provide an important measure of whether the ANC can rebuild support after its historic decline in the 2024 national vote, when it lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since the end of apartheid.
The party’s challenge is particularly significant in major urban centres, where voters have increasingly become focused on service delivery, local governance and the performance of municipal administrations.
ANC faces tougher competition
The ANC remains South Africa’s largest political organisation, but its electoral advantage has narrowed considerably.
In the 2021 municipal elections, the party won about 45.6% nationally — its first result below 50% in a local government election. Its support was particularly weak in major Gauteng metropolitan areas, where its share fell into the 30% range.
The 2026 contest is therefore expected to be fought in an increasingly fragmented political environment.
The Democratic Alliance (DA), Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party, ActionSA and other emerging political movements are competing for voters who once formed part of the ANC’s traditional support base.
The MK Party, which performed strongly in the 2024 national election, is preparing to make its first major municipal-election push, particularly in Gauteng’s metropolitan areas. The South African Communist Party (SACP) is also preparing to contest elections independently after decades of political alignment with the ANC.
Defections add pressure
The ANC is also dealing with the political consequences of defections and factional competition.
For a party that historically benefited from a broad organisational network, the movement of politicians and supporters between parties could have an outsized impact at municipal level, where relatively small shifts in support can determine who controls a council.
The challenge is not simply the loss of individual politicians. Defections can take established local networks, campaign structures and loyal voters with them, making it harder for the ANC to maintain its traditional electoral machinery.
The party’s difficulties are compounded by internal competition over candidate selection and leadership. The ANC’s own guidelines for the 2026 elections emphasise the need to select candidates capable of performing executive roles and delivering development at local level.
A new generation of voters
Perhaps the more significant challenge for the ANC is generational.
A large segment of South Africa’s electorate has no direct personal experience of apartheid and does not necessarily view the ANC through the same historical lens as older generations.
For younger voters, employment, electricity, housing, corruption, public safety and the quality of municipal services can matter more than the ANC’s liberation credentials.
Research into South African voting behaviour has also pointed to an important trend: some former ANC supporters are increasingly choosing not to switch directly to another party but instead disengaging from elections altogether.
That creates a difficult problem for the ANC. Winning back dissatisfied voters may require more than attacking opposition parties; it may require convincing people who have stopped believing that elections can improve their daily lives to participate again.
The battle for South Africa’s cities
The metropolitan municipalities are likely to be among the most closely watched battlegrounds.
Johannesburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni have already demonstrated how competitive South African urban politics has become. The ANC’s support in these municipalities fell sharply in the 2021 local elections, while coalition politics has increasingly become part of municipal governance.
The 2026 elections could therefore produce more fragmented councils, forcing parties to negotiate coalitions rather than govern alone.
For the ANC, that would represent another major shift from the political environment it dominated for decades.
A test of Ramaphosa’s leadership
The election will also be closely watched as a test of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s ability to stabilise the ANC.
The party remains part of South Africa’s Government of National Unity following the 2024 election, but it must now campaign against some of the same parties with which it shares national government responsibilities.
That creates a complicated political balancing act.
The ANC needs to defend its record while competing against parties that can point to municipal failures and present themselves as alternatives. At the same time, its coalition partners have their own incentives to expand their support at local level.
What the 2026 election could reveal
The local elections will not simply determine who controls South Africa’s municipalities. They could provide a clearer indication of the country’s emerging political order.
If the ANC manages to recover significant support, it could demonstrate that the party’s decline after 2024 was not irreversible.
But another substantial fall would strengthen the argument that South African politics is undergoing a long-term realignment away from ANC dominance.
The country’s political landscape is already more competitive than it was a decade ago. With new parties attracting younger voters, established opposition parties attempting to expand their reach and former ANC supporters increasingly willing to abstain or switch allegiance, the 2026 local elections could become one of the most consequential municipal contests in South Africa’s democratic history.
For the ANC, the central question is no longer simply whether it can win elections. It is whether it can persuade a changing electorate that it remains relevant to the next generation.
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