South African general election, 2019

[F. Joe Haydn]

All the parties are terrible, but I'd probably go with the ANC as the least bad since Zuma is no longer in charge.

[Lechasseur]

Freedom Front Plus (VF+)

[Sirius_]

DA

[DavidB.]

Freedom Front Plus (VF+)

[😥]

DA

[parochial boy]

Might get out the template "why the DA are disgusting" rant at some point. But at the moment I'm relatively hopeful about the Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party on the basis that being backed by a big trade union like NUMSA will mean they wind up slightly less irrelevant than previous such efforts.

Failing that, probably ANC, but maybe Patricia De Lille's new party. With my nose held in either case.

[Former President tack50]

DA easily.

[PSOL]

United Democratic Movement

[Sirius_]

Might get out the template "why the DA are disgusting" rant at some point. But at the moment I'm relatively hopeful about the Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party on the basis that being backed by a big trade union like NUMSA will mean they wind up slightly less irrelevant than previous such efforts.

Failing that, probably ANC, but maybe Patricia De Lille's new party. With my nose held in either case.

From what I know about you, it's probably just the template "moderates are evil" rant.

[DC Al Fine]

African Christian Democratic Party

United Democratic Movement

Why?

[parochial boy]

Might get out the template "why the DA are disgusting" rant at some point. But at the moment I'm relatively hopeful about the Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party on the basis that being backed by a big trade union like NUMSA will mean they wind up slightly less irrelevant than previous such efforts.

Failing that, probably ANC, but maybe Patricia De Lille's new party. With my nose held in either case.

From what I know about you, it's probably just the template "moderates are evil" rant.

Well I can't be bothered to structure and argument, but here are a few of the DA's highglights, so you can judge for yourself:

 - Establishing themselves as the second party with the campaign slogan "take back control", as a white party, in South Africa
 - Winning the votes of low income coloureds (and whites) and a nudge-nudge-wink-wink strategy of low key resentment about the ANC being the "black" party, and especially about those "blacks" who come here, build their shacks where everyone can see them and get prioritised for housing as a result
 - As the main party in Cape Town, overseeing the wholesale eviction of poorer, mostly coloured, inhabitants of formerly poor inner city suburbs that are now becoming desireable and sending them out to far flung, crime infested, underdevoloped corrugated iron shacks miles away from any sort of employment opportunities
 - Promising that this would be temporary, but leaving the deportees in the tin shacks for years on end
 - Doing this, in South Africa, a country which is basically infamous for spending most of the 20th century deporting black people out of the desirable areas
 - pushing out the one person in the party who thought that this, on the balance, wasn't a great thing
 - Mismanaging a water crisis that sees Cape Town almost run out of water. A water crisis exacerbated by their strategy of "developing" these far flung suburbs, putting even more pressure on the city's creaking infrastructre
 - deciding to "shame" the people responsible for wasting the most water, and in doing so, "shaming", not rich people with swimming pools, but a low income coloured township which wastes the most water... because of chronic leakages in the water pipes that the DA had refused to address; and claiming that they hadn't done anything because the locals had never bothered to raise the issue
 - focussing police resources on protecting people in uber rich white suburbs, while neglecting the near-war zone situations in old townships in the Cape Flats. Because tourists never go to Manenberg right?
 - To top it all of, Helen Zille is now caught up in a corruption scandal of her own.

So yeah, I guess I just don't like "moderates"

United Democratic Movement

I mean, Holomisa isn't a bad guy by the standards of contemporary SA politics. Especially compared to basically all the other former homeland leaders. But the main reason the UDM even exist is down to slightly esoteric hang ups from apartheid era Transkei politics - so unless you were, well, Xhosa, it would be pretty strange to support them

[Velasco]

I definitely vote "other", maybe #forgood ; D

Ramaphosa is not as terrible as Zuma (gone for good!), but the ANC is inevitably corrupt due to its hegemonic position. DA would never be my choice due to its white elite condition. EFF and the other minor parties in parliament are not great. The only option for me is supporting some fringe party in the left, or voting for the "Good" De Lille

[Sirius_]

The DA's current leader in parliament is a black man and their predecessors in the 20th century were anti-apartheid. The idea of them being racist doesn't add up.

[parochial boy]

Seriously dude, this isn't complicated. Maimane may be on the less terrible end of the party but the points are

1. The DA as a whole may not be racist, but there are influential individuals in the party (Zille, Leon) who have some... troubling opinions on race. Likewise, they have been very happy to take advantage of simmering ethnic tensions, especially as regards the large scale immigration of xhosas from the former teanskei and ciskei to Cape Town, for electoral gain

2. While in power, they have implemented policies that have at best neglected and at worst targeted the poor, to the advantage of the rich. In a country with as much poverty as South Africa, this has had an appalling human impact. And in a country where poverty is as racialised as it is in South Africa, it has disproportionately hit coloureds and blacks. Seriously, do your history lessons, expelling people from their lifelong homes to corrugated iron shacks in a wasteland 50km away has a really unfortunate historical parallel.

[MAINEiac4434]

I'd find some #trueleft party with no hope of winning any seats in parliament to support.

Could never support the DA after Helen Zille praised colonialism. The DA's support among Black Saffers should be indicative of where they stand on racial issues. Being anti-apartheid back when that was relevant doesn't mean they aren't bad on racial issues now, especially since they're basically the only
"white" party left.

[America Needs R'hllor]

DA easily.

[seb_pard]

EFF

[Kingpoleon]

> Criticizes Patricia de Lille’s mismanagement of Cape Town
> Criticizes DA for forcing her to leave

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

DA.  The ANC is corrupt and the EFF are insane/racist. 

[Conservatopia]

Vote DA, support VF+

ANC are corrupt and drifting towards Malema-ism.

The EFF are awful and completely racist.  I can only assume that those who picked them here have no idea of their murderous policies.

[America Needs R'hllor]

The EFF are awful and completely racist.  I can only assume that those who picked them here have no idea of their murderous policies.

bold of you to assume we did not pick them because of those policies.

Millitaristic mysoginists are awesome as long as they're socialist enough, right?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Hot take: there is no fundamental difference between populist right wing parties in Europe and the EFF.

[Chunk Yogurt for President!]

Hot take: there is no fundamental difference between populist right wing parties in Europe and the EFF.

EFF has a lot in common with the BNP, though I don't see why UKIP should be put in the same category as them.

[brucejoel99]

DA easily.

DA.  The ANC is corrupt and the EFF are insane/racist. 

[parochial boy]

> Criticizes Patricia de Lille’s mismanagement of Cape Town
> Criticizes DA for forcing her to leave

https://ewn.co.za/2018/11/01/brett-herron-resigns-from-da

Probably worth reading re-understanding why she, and many of her allies, resigned. Or learning english, or something.

ANC are corrupt and drifting towards Malema-ism.

eh, not so much any more. The general consensus is that Ramaphosa is actually leading the party away from the Zuma-esque nativism in a more "social-liberal" direction.

It is certainly true that the ANC is experiencing a major factional battle between the Zuma-nativist-nationalist wing (which Malema originally came from, because that factional divide isn't new); and Ramaphosa's liberal wing. But the ANC has had a series of recent good results in council by-elections. They have been winning in places the DA won in 2016 (and which are actually majority Coloured or Indian rather than black), which probably both gives the liberals the upper hand.

Also, complain the EFF are racist but support the white separatists?