South Africa’s election management body, The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC), faced an unprecedented situation in the run-up to the country’s fifth elections. Its chairperson, Pansy Tlakula, was found to have behaved in a manner unbefitting an electoral commissioner. Her misconduct raised concerns about whether or not the IEC would manage the elections impartially. […]
The African National Congress (ANC) result in South Africa’s national and provincial elections of 2014 sings in two voices – ‘extraordinary repeat victory’ and ‘monolith in gradual decline’. The fact that the party continued to dominate, with 62% of the national vote, was a significant achievement in this fifth set of national-provincial elections in democratic […]
In the 2014 election the Democratic Alliance (DA) strengthened its electoral support nationally as well as in the Western Cape province, where it governs. It gained over a million new national votes, increasing its total from 2945 829 in 2009 to 4 091 548 in 2014. It also unseated the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) as […]
South Africa’s first decade of democracy, 1994-2004, delivered a high volume of governing and opposition alliances and coalitions in South Africa. These alliances and coalitions catalysed the party system and facilitated the consolidation of ANC power. Simultaneously, alliances in this decade triggered the main opposition party, the DA, which continued to dominate opposition politics numerically […]
