2024 South African general election, 29 May:

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

I do wonder if South African Indians will keep voting DA in the future if a sectional party pops up; South African Indians have probably done the best  since the 1990s in terms of catching up with the white population but they haven't exactly assimilated into it.

[Duke of York]

What are the demographics of Black DA voters anyway ? There was a bunch of press about them reaching out to the black middle class but did that ever lead to anything ?

2019 went badly. Mmusi Maimane was fired and a buch of other black figures like Herman Masahaba, Lindiwe Mazibuko, Phumzile Van Damme all left; all complaining about the way the party treated them. The DA doubled down on white identity politics and we have the delightful results we have, a very different entity to what they were 10 years ago.

As for Black DA voters, it's hard to tell as the question of where do you live as a middle class black person, as they might live areas that are now fairly racially mixed like Rosebank in Johanneburg or in wealthy areas of former townships.

In the case of Rosebank, it's hard to tell exactly how black people their vote. Except that this year the DA vote was stable while the ANC collapsed from about 25% to 10%, mainly to ActionSA and Rise Mzansi. In the case of the latter, the best example I know is the eastern part of Diepkloof in Soweto, which had a DA vote of about 10% in 2014/19 before going big for ActionSA in 2021, and has no results yet.

On the whole, I would guess that black people who leave the townships to former white-now mixed areas are probably more likely to vote DA.

Pomfret has reported no? At least I saw from a Dawie tweet yesterday and it was unanimous eff and anc.  UMnengi is definitely DAs best success case in the nation.

A rural area in the ward has. The actual village, not yet. Although, in reality, what characterises it the most is it's turnout rates.

Has DA abandoned the white identity politics? if so great.

[Logical]

Gauteng Projection

ANC 35% (-15)
DA 27% (-)
EFF 12% (-3)
MK 10% (new)
ActionSA 4% (new)
FF+ 3% (-1)
PA 2% (+2)
IFP 1% (-)
Rise 1% (new)
BOSA 1% (new)

Good luck trying to form a stable government here.

[Duke of York]

Gauteng Projection

ANC 35% (-15)
DA 27% (-)
EFF 12% (-3)
MK 10% (new)
ActionSA 4% (new)
FF+ 3% (-1)
PA 2% (+2)
IFP 1% (-)
Rise 1% (new)
BOSA 1% (new)

Good luck trying to form a stable government here.

what happens if a coalition can't be formed or one collapses?

[Estrella]

It's going to take like a week to count this damn thing, isn't it.

https://twitter.com/SnowReportSA/status/1796181609760051527

[Flyersfan232]

It's going to take like a week to count this damn thing, isn't it.

https://twitter.com/SnowReportSA/status/1796181609760051527

is the anc corrupt enough to commit fraud?

[parochial boy]

The big thing in Gauteng is ANC plus EFF below 50%. The ANC's provincial leader Panyaza Lesufi was pretty clear on that being his intended coalition, so in that respects it's a blow for the non-Ramaphoza, more radical wing of the ANC. Could be one to follow.

I do wonder if South African Indians will keep voting DA in the future if a sectional party pops up; South African Indians have probably done the best  since the 1990s in terms of catching up with the white population but they haven't exactly assimilated into it.

The interesting thing is that there was an Indian interests party, but it has all but dissapeared. I suspect Durban's own racial relations plus as you say the relative success of the community will keep them DA for the forseeable. But I could just as easily be wrong. Looking forward to finally seeing some results from eThekwini.

Has DA abandoned the white identity politics? if so great.

Quite the contrary, it was a central feature of this campaign. And I fear this result will encourage them to stay on that course, at the cost of being a party that will never be capable of getting above the 20% level.

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

Is there a description for why Zulus are supporting MK beyond ethnic nationalism? Like how did Zuma retain any sort of popularity ?

[lfromnj]

Wonder what the KZN coalition will be

[parochial boy]

Is there a description for why Zulus are supporting MK beyond ethnic nationalism? Like how did Zuma retain any sort of popularity ?

He has always played on this image of being a good Zulu boy being persecuted by the (Xhosa) ANC establishment, which the various court cases and the like will have confirmed in the eyes of most of his supported. Just like his imprisonment back in 2021 did. That in addition to playing up a Zulu cultural identity, you know, wearing Zulu garb, going to traditional festivities, traditional family structures (polygamy, that is), keeping a home in Nkandla rather than moving to Houghton like the other ANC presidents. All of which give him a sort of homely appeal to a lot of traditional minded Zulus.

That and, what a lot of people explicitely say is something like - oh yes, he stole all the money, but back then we didn't have loadshedding, the economy was better, unemployment wasn't so high; all of that. Of course, it was Zuma's mismanagement that was a major cause of all those things; and the economic situation was already pretty dire at the time. But has got worse since, so some people do view those times as having been better days.

[Oryxslayer]

Wonder what the KZN coalition will be

Zuma's friends and family have already said no to working with the ANC there. Maybe things change if the two groups somehow reconcile nationally, but barring that they seemingly would prefer something with the appropriate African and 'leftist vibes.' The EFF are not really relevant there enough to provide a majority, which leaves the IFP as seemingly the next viable option, though they are allied to the DA both nationally and in a number of local situations.

[Estrella]

National result with 27% counted:
ANC 42.2%
DA 25.4%
EFF 8.9%
MK 8.2%
PA 4.0%
IFP 2.3%
VF 2.0%
Action 0.9%
ACDP 0.6%
UDM 0.6%
Cape Coloured Congress 0.5%
Others 4.4%

[Logical]

Almost an entire day and not a single official result from eThekwini (Durban) yet.

[MRS DONNA SHALALA]

Has DA abandoned the white identity politics? if so great.

Quite the contrary, it was a central feature of this campaign. And I fear this result will encourage them to stay on that course, at the cost of being a party that will never be capable of getting above the 20% level.

I'm definitely in a bubble as a white CapeTonian who is also an expat, so can you elaborate on how they made it a central feature of the campaign? I'm not talking tone-deafness, that's always been a DA problem.

Policy-wise I've largely considered the DA to be roughly aligned with the moderate wing of the US dem party, or the Lib-Dems in the UK. Vaguely pro-business, vaguely socially liberal, boring, with minimal bomb-throwers. I think myself and my peers largely support them due to the excellent job they do running the WC, the lack of visible corruption/embezzlement, and the lack of viable alternatives.

Not trying to argue - just legitimately curious, since from my perspective VF+ has always been the party of racial dogwhistles and a desire for a return of the "good old days".

[lfromnj]

I’ll definitely say the DA has been talking a lot more about woke. Even if it’s good policy behind the scenes it’s pretty dumb politics to go after a few fraction of a percent FF+ votes.

[Estrella]

Elections 2024: Counting almost complete by Thursday afternoon, says IEC

"By 15:00, most voting stations had finished counting. By 16:00, results had been concluded for 22.6% of the 23 292 voting districts."

Is IEC adding up the numbers with an abacus they stole from the National Museum or what?

[Flyersfan232]

What is PA?

[parochial boy]

Has DA abandoned the white identity politics? if so great.

Quite the contrary, it was a central feature of this campaign. And I fear this result will encourage them to stay on that course, at the cost of being a party that will never be capable of getting above the 20% level.

I'm definitely in a bubble as a white CapeTonian who is also an expat, so can you elaborate on how they made it a central feature of the campaign? I'm not talking tone-deafness, that's always been a DA problem.

Policy-wise I've largely considered the DA to be roughly aligned with the moderate wing of the US dem party, or the Lib-Dems in the UK. Vaguely pro-business, vaguely socially liberal, boring, with minimal bomb-throwers. I think myself and my peers largely support them due to the excellent job they do running the WC, the lack of visible corruption/embezzlement, and the lack of viable alternatives.

Not trying to argue - just legitimately curious, since from my perspective VF+ has always been the party of racial dogwhistles and a desire for a return of the "good old days".

Back in 2014 I think that was certainly the case, a lack of care and sensitivity and a degree of clumsiness but not necessarily bad intentions, but as lfromnj says, that's the principal thing that Helen Zille talks about these days.

But in particular there are three things that stand out as examples:

1. The letter to the US ambassador asking them to come in and monitor the elections, as in the IEC were too incompetent, the ANC too corrupt and feckless, the MK party too dangerous that all came across as a slightly too explicit attack on South Africa's democracy.

2. The flag burning ad, as in, why would you burn possibly the most visible signal of post-apartheid Sout African unity? No matter what the rest of the add did.

3. The attacks on ActionSA and Rise Mzansi for campaigning on the state of Cape Town townships. Steenhuisen explicitely saying that they were only there because there was nothing left to loot in the rest of the country. Like black people couldn't possibly run things and that the Western Cape was somehow "their" turf. Literally videos did the same thing of PW Botha saying the same thing back in the 1980s

That on the back of this sort of end of times campaign theme, the "Vote DA to save South Africa" posters you see everyone; the constant threats that a coalition between the ANC and the EFF or MK party would utterly destroy the country beyond repair. As well as the tones of the "7 million tax payers, 28 million on social grants" line or the "Eastern Cape economic refugees only here to take advantage of our wonderful public services". All things carefully designed to tap in to age old angsts amongst the electorate they were targetting.

[lfromnj]

What is PA?

Corrupt Coloured anti illegal immigration party.

[VPH]

I do wonder if South African Indians will keep voting DA in the future if a sectional party pops up; South African Indians have probably done the best since the 1990s in terms of catching up with the white population but they haven't exactly assimilated into it.

There used to be one, called Minority Front. They had one member in Parliament for some time and provincial representation in Kwazulu-Natal for even longer. Not sure what happened to them but they didn't run in 2024.

[Logical]

I do wonder if South African Indians will keep voting DA in the future if a sectional party pops up; South African Indians have probably done the best since the 1990s in terms of catching up with the white population but they haven't exactly assimilated into it.

There used to be one, called Minority Front. They had one member in Parliament for some time and provincial representation in Kwazulu-Natal for even longer. Not sure what happened to them but they didn't run in 2024.

Their leader died in 2011 and the party fell apart. What remains of their machine defected to DA.

[MRS DONNA SHALALA]

Has DA abandoned the white identity politics? if so great.

Quite the contrary, it was a central feature of this campaign. And I fear this result will encourage them to stay on that course, at the cost of being a party that will never be capable of getting above the 20% level.

I'm definitely in a bubble as a white CapeTonian who is also an expat, so can you elaborate on how they made it a central feature of the campaign? I'm not talking tone-deafness, that's always been a DA problem.

Policy-wise I've largely considered the DA to be roughly aligned with the moderate wing of the US dem party, or the Lib-Dems in the UK. Vaguely pro-business, vaguely socially liberal, boring, with minimal bomb-throwers. I think myself and my peers largely support them due to the excellent job they do running the WC, the lack of visible corruption/embezzlement, and the lack of viable alternatives.

Not trying to argue - just legitimately curious, since from my perspective VF+ has always been the party of racial dogwhistles and a desire for a return of the "good old days".

Back in 2014 I think that was certainly the case, a lack of care and sensitivity and a degree of clumsiness but not necessarily bad intentions, but as lfromnj says, that's the principal thing that Helen Zille talks about these days.

But in particular there are three things that stand out as examples:

1. The letter to the US ambassador asking them to come in and monitor the elections, as in the IEC were too incompetent, the ANC too corrupt and feckless, the MK party too dangerous that all came across as a slightly too explicit attack on South Africa's democracy.

2. The flag burning ad, as in, why would you burn possibly the most visible signal of post-apartheid Sout African unity? No matter what the rest of the add did.

3. The attacks on ActionSA and Rise Mzansi for campaigning on the state of Cape Town townships. Steenhuisen explicitely saying that they were only there because there was nothing left to loot in the rest of the country. Like black people couldn't possibly run things and that the Western Cape was somehow "their" turf. Literally videos did the same thing of PW Botha saying the same thing back in the 1980s

That on the back of this sort of end of times campaign theme, the "Vote DA to save South Africa" posters you see everyone; the constant threats that a coalition between the ANC and the EFF or MK party would utterly destroy the country beyond repair. As well as the tones of the "7 million tax payers, 28 million on social grants" line or the "Eastern Cape economic refugees only here to take advantage of our wonderful public services". All things carefully designed to tap in to age old angsts amongst the electorate they were targetting.

I didn't know about the Helen Zille stuff - that's disappointing and it definitely makes me uncomfortable, but I haven't seen any of that reflected in the DA's manifestos or policies, and I don't think many non-engaged voters really know who she is. Like, just because Joe Manchin is "anti-woke" doesn't mean all US Democrats are.

The other three points, I would deem as tone-deaf, but you seem to be reading them in the worst possible light:

1) I didn't know about this. It's a dumb stunt but I don't see any racial grievance here - The IEC pretty clearly did handle the election poorly, and many people were quite clearly disenfranchised through their incompetent handling of the election. And calling a party corrupt when their last two presidents have had clear corruption scandals isn't wrong.

2) Again, dumb stunt, bad optics, tone deaf. But the end of the ad has the flag being restored with the tagline "vote DA to save SA." If your party's position is that an ANC coalition with the EFF or the MK party is an existential threat to the country, it makes sense as an illustration of that point. If the flag got replaced with the apartheid-era flag or even stayed burned, I'd agree with you, but that's not what happened.

3) Steenhuisen was pretty clearly referring to the risk of an ANC-controlled Western Cape, who have a clear record of enriching themselves using South Africa's coffers in every province they run.

As for their fire and brimstone campaign slogans, pretty much every political party in every nation says that their opposition is going to destroy the country in some shape or form. That's just politics.

I was born post-apartheid so maybe I'm not tuned in to certain dogwhistles older DA voters are hearing, but to me a lot of this seems like boilerplate political attacks based on the poor record of the ruling party. I would call the VF+'s campaign which is essentially "Make South Africa Great Again" more in-line with a campaign of racial resentment. But again, I'm very privileged and in a bubble, so maybe I'm missing something.

[Logical]

CSIR/SABC seat projection

Regional
ANC 88
DA 43
MK 26
EFF 22
IFP 9
PA 4
ActionSA 2
VF+ 2
Al Jama 1
CCC 1
RISE 1
UDM 1

National
ANC 75
DA 43
MK 30
EFF 16
IFP 8
PA 5
VF+ 5
ActionSA 3
ACDP 3
ATM 2
BOSA 2
PAC 2
Al Jama 1
GOOD 1
CCC 1
RISE 1
UDM 1
UAT 1

Total
ANC 163 (-67)
DA 86 (+2)
MK 56 (new)
EFF 38 (-6)
IFP 17 (+3)
PA 9 (+9)
VF+ 7 (-3)
ActionSA 5 (new)
ACDP 3 (-1)
Al Jama 2 (+1)
ATM 2 (-)
PAC 2 (+1)
BOSA 2 (new)
CCC 2 (new)
RISE 2 (new)
UDM 2 (-)
GOOD 1 (-1)
UAT 1 (new)
AIC 0 (-2)
COPE 0 (-2)
NFP 0 (-2)

[GM Team Member and Acting PPT WB]

well, at least RISE is getting some seats... but this is looking like a mess generally.

[Anti-Trump Truth Socialite JD Vance Enjoying Juror]

ANC+DA, ANC+MK, and ANC+EFF would be 2-party coalitions that can get to 200, though depending on exact numbers ANC+EFF might fall just short. It seems to me that neither of the first two are likely though.