After the November 4 local government elections, Julius Malema and Jacob Zuma may hold the balance of power in South Africa’s biggest and most economically important cities. That should worry ratepayers, investors and both parties.
The EFF and MK could jointly command 20%–25% in some contested councils. If neither the ANC nor the DA wins outright, the two men decide who becomes mayor, who controls the budget and which parties get the strongest portfolios.
They are also the worst coalition partners on offer. Both lead highly centralised parties built around their founders. Neither has a credible record in municipal government. Both prefer aggressive populism to the compromises needed to keep water flowing, roads repaired and revenue collected.
There is an alternative. The ANC and DA should take the cooperation they built in the government of national unity (GNU) and extend it into hung municipalities.
They disagree profoundly on transformation, economic policy and property rights and will remain rivals. But both are committed to constitutional government and an economy able to finance public services. In municipalities approaching collapse, that matters more than ideological purity.
The 2021 election left 66 councils hung. That number is unlikely to fall in November and may rise as MK, the Patriotic Alliance, the IFP, ActionSA and small local parties fragment the vote.
At least five metros – Johannesburg, Tshwane, Ekurhuleni, eThekwini and Nelson Mandela Bay – are likely to be hung. Mangaung could join them if the ANC loses the 51 of 101 seats it holds there.
These cities cannot afford another five years of musical chairs.
Johannesburg had five mayors in the 18 months to May 2023. Eight people have held the office since 2016, two of them twice. Governments have been built and broken by parties with tiny mandates. Kabelo Gwamanda became mayor while Al Jama-ah held three of the council’s 270 seats. That was not the voters’ will. It was what larger parties settled for when they could not agree.
While politicians fought over positions, Johannesburg’s water, electricity and road infrastructure decayed. Residents got dry taps, dead traffic lights, power cuts and rising bills. Tshwane, Ekurhuleni and Nelson Mandela Bay have followed the same pattern: mayors removed before their programmes land, senior managers working under constantly changing instructions, and budgets traded as bargaining chips.
This is not democracy working. It is fragmentation paralysing government.
On the 2021 seat count, the ANC and DA together held 60% of Johannesburg’s council, 67% of Tshwane, 67% of Ekurhuleni, 69% of eThekwini, 80% of Nelson Mandela Bay and 76% of Mangaung.
Those numbers will shift in November, especially in eThekwini, where MK has reordered KwaZulu-Natal politics. An ANC–DA combination should still command clear majorities in all six.
The principle could be simple: the party with the most seats takes the mayoralty; the second takes the deputy mayoralty, the speakership and a proportional share of mayoral committee posts.
It should not be renegotiated city by city behind closed doors. The two should agree on one national framework: a binding five-year programme, merit-based appointments, independent supply-chain controls, public performance targets and dispute resolution. Neither should be able to collapse a council over a national row or a local leader’s ambition. Voters should know the terms before they vote.
The GNU has already shown the value of cooperation between the two largest parties. Whatever its tensions, it kept national power out of the hands of the EFF and MK after the ANC lost its majority in 2024. The same logic produced KwaZulu-Natal’s government of provincial unity: the IFP, ANC, DA and NFP combined to keep the province working after MK won 37 of the legislature’s 80 seats, and the IFP’s Thami Ntuli became premier. Without it, MK would have set the terms.
Municipalities need the same firewall.
This is not an argument for excluding the EFF and MK because their policies are radical. Their voters are entitled to representation. The danger is handing struggling cities to parties whose coalition conduct offers no assurance of stable administration.
The EFF has 982 councillors and roughly 10% of the national vote, yet outright control of no municipality. Malema has repeatedly used his council votes to install other parties’ mayors but has never built an EFF government voters can judge.
MK is less tested still. It has never run a municipality, a province or a national department in its own name. Its structures remain bound to Zuma’s personal authority, and many of its prominent figures emerged from the political networks of the worst years of state capture.
An EFF–MK bloc could be big enough to bring governments down and too undisciplined to run them. Every budget, appointment and motion of no confidence becomes another round of bargaining.
The ANC and DA are not innocent here. The ANC presided over cadre deployment, corruption and administrative decay in dozens of councils. The DA has added to the instability through rigid coalition management and an inability to hold smaller partners.
A pact would work only if both dropped the belief that cooperation means the other side’s surrender. The ANC would have to accept professional administration, tighter financial controls and consequences for corruption. The DA would have to accept that transformation and the extension of services to neglected communities are core municipal functions, not optional concessions.
That would not end competition. It would move it from motions of no confidence to measurable performance. The party running finance could be judged on revenue collection, and the party running infrastructure on water losses, road repairs and capital spending. Residents could compare results instead of counting mayors.
Malema and Zuma may emerge from November as kingmakers. South Africa’s biggest cities should not have to depend on them. The ANC and DA already have the combined mandate to govern the metros. Their duty is to use it.
A grand municipal coalition would be uncomfortable, argumentative and imperfect. Five years of predictable government still beats another term of collapsing coalitions, proxy mayors and looting.
Top image collage: EFF (Facebook.
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