The week ahead: Hill-Lewis hops to it

The DA is heading into its post-John Steenhuisen era, with its federal congress over the weekend electing the party’s new leaders. While incoming party leader Geordin Hill-Lewis will hit the ground running to get on top of national issues this week, the ANC is focused on local-level politics. Here’s what else you need to know for the week ahead.

Politics

ANC’s 2026 campaign gathers momentum

The ANC’s national executive committee met last Friday to discuss the party’s 2026 election campaign, including the timelines for metro candidates. The ANC will open nominations for metro mayors this week and a final candidate list will be made public in June.

The NEC also discussed the independent campaigning of the SACP. The SACP remains a member of the tripartite alliance (with the ANC and Cosatu) but is increasingly acting independently of its alliance partners, and contesting by-elections against the ANC.

Sakhisizwe by-election

One by-election will be contested on Wednesday, in ward 9 of Sakhisizwe, in the Eastern Cape. The ANC, EFF and African Transformation Movement (ATM) are the only parties running in a ward won by the ANC in 2021 with 60% of the vote (an independent won 31.5%, the EFF won 3.5%, and ATM won 1.7%).

In the 2024 national election the ANC won 84.5% of the vote to the EFF’s 5.5%. The ATM and United Democratic Movement both won 2% of the vote.

A new era for the DA

The DA’s federal congress concluded yesterday with Geordin Hill-Lewis being elected leader and Ashor Sarupen chair of the federal council. Solly Msimanga was elected federal chair and Siviwe Gwarube, Cilliers Brink and Solly Malatsi were elected deputy federal chairs. Mark Burke was elected chair of the federal finance committee.

It will be a busy first week for Hill-Lewis as he begins to implement his strategic vision for the party and gets to grips with running the organisation while remaining mayor of the City of Cape Town. Attention will shift this week to the race for parliamentary leader of the DA. The fact that Hill-Lewis will remain in local government means the party needs to elect a head in parliament – a mirror of the time when Helen Zille ran the DA from outside parliament. Frontrunners for the role are said to include Andrew Whitfield, current chief whip George Michalakis and Glynnis Breytenbach, chair of the DA’s federal legal commission.

Economics

Gold production (February)

Gold output numbers will be released on Thursday morning. The market consensus is for double-digit year-on-year growth, largely due to base effects from 2025, including load-shedding in March 2025 and much higher gold spot prices, allowing higher production at marginal mines

Mining output and sales (March)

Overall mining production figures will also be released on Thursday morning. Month-on-month growth is expected to improve from 2.9% in February to 3.7%, but the much higher increase in year-on-year growth is due to the same base factors and higher commodity prices, including strong price gains in chromium, manganese and platinum-group metals.

SACCI business confidence index (February)

The latest index number will be released on Thursday morning. The market consensus is for a small increase to 132 from January’s 131.4 reading: though geopolitical risk increased sharply over March, this is unlikely to have been factored into February’s numbers. Next month’s numbers will be more useful to market watchers.

This article is published courtesy of The South Africa Brief, a political newsletter published on Substack which is a collaboration between Paul Berkowitz and Jonathan Moakes. It provides analysis and insight into the new, uncertain era of South African politics heralded by the 2024 general election. Including a specific focus on municipal politics, it will provide full analysis in the run-up to this year’s municipal polls. 

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