The African National Congress (ANC), a pivotal force in South African politics for nearly three decades, holds a historical significance that commands respect and reverence. Since the fall of apartheid in 1994, it has governed at the national level without interruption, shaping the country’s democratic institutions, defining its national identity, and setting the parameters of political discourse. For many South Africans, the ANC was not merely a political party but the embodiment of liberation and the guarantor of progress. Its legacy was intertwined with the moral authority of Nelson Mandela and the transformative hope of the 1990s.
However, the party's hold on power began to wane over time. Persistent economic inequality, service delivery failures, institutional decay, and endemic corruption steadily eroded public confidence. Despite these challenges, the ANC remained electorally dominant, benefiting from its liberation credentials and the weakness of its opposition. This equilibrium was shattered in the 2024 national elections, when the ANC secured just over 40 percent of the vote, falling short of a parliamentary majority for the first time since 1994. This marked a seismic shift in the political landscape, compelling the party into a governing coalition with ideological rivals and former opponents.
The ensuing Government of National Unity was not born from a unified vision or national crisis, as had been the case during South Africa’s post-apartheid transition. Instead, it emerged from political necessity. Months of negotiation yielded an unprecedented alliance between the ANC and several other parties, most prominently the Democratic Alliance (DA), along with the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), the Patriotic Alliance (PA), GOOD, and the Freedom Front Plus (FF Plus). The term "unity" belied the profound differences within this grouping, reflecting more a fragile consensus on stability than any shared long-term agenda.
One year into this coalition arrangement, the political terrain has begun to settle, though not without strain. The country has remained stable, avoiding a constitutional crisis or administrative paralysis. Parliament continues to sit, ministries remain operational, and though still uneven, public services have not collapsed. Yet this surface-level continuity masks profound tensions beneath. In many respects, the coalition is a patchwork of competing interests and clashing worldviews, bound together less by mutual trust than by strategic calculation and the fear of political fragmentation.
As the largest party in the coalition and the presidency holder, the ANC retains substantial influence. Cyril Ramaphosa leads the executive, and the ANC controls many senior ministerial posts. But the party no longer governs with the latitude it once enjoyed. Every major policy initiative now requires delicate negotiation. Holding a significant share of portfolios and key committee positions, the DA has introduced its priorities into the national agenda. Its platform, oriented toward market liberalism, institutional accountability, and meritocratic governance, often contrasts with the ANC’s developmental and redistributive ethos. This ideological dissonance has led to delays, compromises, and, in some cases, policy incoherence, underscoring the challenges of the coalition.
Some of this pluralism is arguably healthy. It has created new spaces for debate within the executive, opened avenues for oversight, and diminished the sense of invincibility that long surrounded the ANC. In areas such as infrastructure, public finances, and anti-corruption, there are signs that cross-party collaboration has introduced new rigor and discipline. The presence of multiple voices has forced the ANC to explain and defend its decisions more clearly and has occasionally sharpened policy focus.
Yet the limitations of this arrangement are becoming increasingly evident, underscoring the complexity and gravity of the situation. The coalition struggles to move decisively on urgent issues. Disagreements over economic reform, land redistribution, and restructuring of state-owned enterprises have hindered progress. Questions of public sector wage management, energy security, and education reform have been the subject of repeated delays. The need to secure consensus among parties with divergent mandates has diluted bold proposals, while politically costly reforms are often deferred altogether. This gradualism has frustrated citizens and eroded early optimism that coalition rule might produce a more responsive and efficient government.
For the ANC, coalition politics has brought a painful reckoning. The party is no longer the sole arbiter of national policy. Internally, this shift has amplified existing fissures. Ramaphosa’s approach, centered on pragmatism and coalition-building, is not universally accepted within the party. Some members argue that the alliance with the DA betrays the ANC’s historical mission and alienates its traditional base. Others worry that the party is ceding ideological ground without sufficient electoral benefit. The coalition has complicated the ANC’s public messaging, forcing it to balance its identity as a liberation movement with its new role as a senior partner in a multi-party government. This struggle is evident in its public communications.
This internal tension is not merely rhetorical. It affects how the ANC governs and positions itself for future elections. The party’s traditional constituencies, including workers, the rural disenfranchised, and township residents, have begun to question whether the ANC still speaks for their interests. The symbolic unity once bound the party together has frayed as regional leaders, alliance partners, and internal factions pursue divergent paths. Whether the ANC can navigate this complexity while preserving its cohesion is an open question.
The broader opposition landscape has also evolved in response to the coalition. The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have embraced their role as the leading opposition force outside the GNU. It has intensified its parliamentary theatrics and mass mobilizations by framing the coalition as an arrangement of elites that excludes the working class. Julius Malema’s party has capitalized on ideological inconsistencies within the GNU, portraying it as rudderless and beholden to market forces. This approach has helped the EFF remain visible and relevant among disaffected youth. However, it continues to face questions about its long-term viability as a governing force rather than a vehicle for protest. In addition, some of Julius Malema’s past statements, including his conviction for hate speech, are enough to make specific sectors of the South African public weary of him. Interestingly, Malema was listed on Time's Least Influential People of 2010, only to make Forbes 10 Youngest Power Men in Africa the following year, suggesting a very divided view of his effectiveness as a leader. Regardless of how you feel about Malema, his party remains unlikely to earnestly contend for leadership any time soon due to their size and their views, which include arming Hamas.
The MK Party, led by Jacob Zuma, has positioned itself as an uncompromising outsider. Rooted in KZN and energized by Zuma’s populist appeal, MK has targeted voters alienated by the ANC’s concessions and the DA’s growing influence. Parliament has adopted a confrontational tone, emphasizing its distance from the GNU and casting itself as the only authentic voice of the marginalized. However, MK’s rapid rise brings risks, including internal divisions, legal uncertainty around Zuma’s leadership, and a lack of policy coherence beyond grievance politics. However, the party lacks a lot of coherence required to be a sufficient challenge to the ANC. Many of the party's core positions are sometimes with one another. For example, the party has been described as Zulu nationalist and pan-African simultaneously, an apparent logical contradiction. The party also says they are socialist and engage in left-wing populism but are socially conservative. Overall, the party's focus on Zulu nationalism has excluded a good portion of non-Zulu South Africans, and the party's inconsistent message on social issues has chased off even more, making them a disruptor to the ANC but not a real challenger. Ultimately, this can be seen in the election results in 2024, where they won a plurality with 44.9% of the vote in the traditional Zulu homeland of KwaZulu-Natal. However, this was the only province in which they won the vote, and in fact, they failed to have a single member elected across several regions, proving they could only play spoiler.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Alliance (DA), though nominally still an opposition party, now finds itself deeply embedded in government. Outside of the ANC itself, the DA is the largest party in parliament, making it a challenge to the ANC's dominance. Its participation in the coalition has granted it significant influence over national policy, particularly in fiscal management and institutional reform. But this role has complicated its identity. While the DA portrays itself as a stabilizing force committed to competence and accountability, it has drawn criticism for compromising with the ANC and risking alienation from its base. The challenge lies in proving that its participation brings tangible results without being subsumed by the establishment it once sought to challenge. In the future, the DA will have to present itself as separate enough from the ANC and ready to lead in its own right if it wants to take over.
Together, these parties represent divergent paths for opposition politics in South Africa: one radical and anti-systemic, one populist and regionally rooted, and one institutionally embedded. Their evolution will help shape not only the 2029 elections but the broader contours of South Africa’s democratic future.
Internationally, South Africa’s coalition experiment is being closely watched. As one of the continent’s leading democracies, its ability to manage political pluralism and shared governance carries implications beyond its borders. Diplomats and investors have expressed guarded optimism, noting the absence of systemic collapse. However, there are concerns about policy uncertainty, leadership fragmentation, and the possibility of renewed instability if the coalition proves unsustainable.
Ultimately, the first year of South Africa’s unity government has revealed both the promise and the peril of coalition politics. It has disrupted entrenched patterns of governance and created new political possibilities. Yet, it has also exposed the difficulty of reconciling divergent mandates within a single executive framework. The ANC remains central to this story, both as the party most affected by the transition and as the institution still capable of shaping national direction. Whether it can adapt to a new era of power-sharing without losing its identity or legitimacy will be a defining test of its political maturity.
The coalition has not ushered in a revolution nor collapsed into dysfunction. It has produced an uneasy but functioning equilibrium that may endure if underwritten by public demand for accountability and performance. But that equilibrium remains fragile. The choices made in the months ahead by the ANC, its partners, and the broader political class will determine whether South Africa emerges from this transition period with a more resilient democracy or slides into greater polarization and drift.
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