The ANC is facing its toughest electoral challenge since 1994, bogged down by a stagnant economy, high unemployment and a scandal-dogged president.
|||Johannesburg/Pretoria - South African polls closed on Wednesday and the tally began for local elections where the ruling African National Congress (ANC) could lose control of key cities for the first time since apartheid ended.
Analysts say the ANC is facing the toughest electoral challenge in its history against the backdrop of high unemployment, an economy not expected to grow this year, and a series of scandals that have dogged President Jacob Zuma.
A significant loss of support would be a blow for a movement that embodied South Africa's liberation struggle. Its next major test comes in national elections in 2019.
Opinion polls see a particularly close race in the capital Pretoria, economic-hub Johannesburg and the symbolic Nelson Mandela Bay municipality named after the anti-apartheid icon.
The opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) was expected to maintain Cape Town, the only big city not run by the ANC.
The DA is a historically white-dominated movement hoping to expand support under its new black leader Mmusi Maimane.
“I voted DA because I'm sick of the rotten, corrupt ANC,” said Simpiwe, an unemployed 55-year-old surrounded by shacks in a rundown Nelson Mandela Bay township on the southeast coast.
He declined to give his second name for fear of reprisals from militant members of the ANC in his neighbourhood. Fires were lit in waste bins on street corners where people gathered to discuss the vote as darkness fell.
First results could be known as early as 2100 local time (1900 GMT) but final results nationwide are not expected before Friday. Polls officially closed at 1900 local time but if people were in line at that time, they could still vote.
Many who queued earlier said they were worried about Zuma's performance and the state of Africa's most industrialised economy, where one in four is unemployed.
Zuma scandals
Security guard Senzo Makhubela said the ANC needed to build more houses and do more to develop areas like Diepsloot, the informal settlement where he lives north of Johannesburg.
But he was sticking with the ruling party for now, despite the travails of its leader. “Zuma doesn't make decisions alone so the ANC is not Zuma alone, it's a collective,” said the 32-year-old.
Zuma survived an impeachment vote in April after the Constitutional Court said he breached the law by ignoring an order to repay some of the millions in state funds spent on renovating his private homestead at Nkandla.
In December, he was widely criticised for changing his finance minister twice in a week, sending the rand plummeting and alarming investors. The currency has since recovered.
Zuma has said he would repay some of the funds spent on his home and rejected the accusations. But anger is rising in a country on the brink of recession. Analysts predict a downgrade by ratings agencies to “junk”.
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) led by firebrand Julius Malema, Zuma's one-time protege and former ANC youth leader, plans to redistribute among poor blacks wealth still mostly in white hands.
In Johannesburg, Edward Mariba, 44, said he voted for the EFF. “I wanted to give the new kids on the block a chance.”
ANC loyalists said they remained confident
Danny Jordaan, the ANC mayor in Nelson Mandela Bay municipality who lead South Africa's successful bid for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, said he expected the ANC to win at least 55 percent of the vote.
Reuters