Thabo Mbeki and the African National Congress are set to romp home next Wednesday, June 2, with about 70% of the vote – well over the two-thirds majority that excites ANC supporters and horrifies the opposition.
The turnout across the country should be high, averaging out at about 90% of registered voters.
Apart from the ANC, the only other real winner will be Tony Leon’s Democratic Party which, with about 36 seats in the National Assembly, could displace the New National Party as the official opposition.
Marthinus van Schalkwyk’s NNP looks like being the biggest loser, with less than half the tally of MPs it achieved in 1994.
The Inkatha Freedom Party could also be forced to eat humble pie – as indisposed as Mangosuthu Buthelezi is to doing so.
The disappointment of the election could be Bantu Holomisa and Roelf Meyer’s United Democratic Movement.
After an impressive start, the UDMrapidly lost momentum over the campaign.
Expect Bishop Stanley Mogoba’s Pan Africanist Congress to hang on to a presence in Parliament by its fingernails (if its hands haven’t been amputated, that is).
The African Christian Democratic Party should slip home on a wing and prayer, while General Constand Viljoen’s Freedom Front will fight its way back.
Western Cape
This one could end up being settled with fists or in the courts if the NNP splits over whether to go into coalition with the DP or the ANC. NNP legislators disagree over which party to join up with to form the Western Cape government; one or other side could refuse to accept whatever decision is taken; rebellious members could lose their seats; and some could ask the courts to determine who has the power to decide a coalition partner.
Local NNP maverick Peter Marais and his national leader, “Kortbroek” van Schalkwyk, are believed to hunger for the rewards that could come from bedding down with the ANC. But most local NNP legislators favour a tie-up with the DP.
No party looks likely to get an absolute majority. Latest opinion polls show the ANC, and NNP are neck and neck. The best prediction will be that one of the two will get 15 seats, the other 16. The DP should get five or more seats. DP sources say they see little sense in an all-party “government of provincial unity”.
The ACDP should also retain a local presence, but Louis Luyt’s Federal Alliance doesn’t seem to have a hope in hell here. This is Stormers territory, man.
Gauteng
The political parachute may have rescued the ANC here. Mbeki’s decision to let loose the outgoing general secretary of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, Mbhazima Shilowa, on the Gauteng ANC in place of the dismally rated Premier Mathole Motshekga has given the ANC campaign a lift. Opinion polls predictions of a clear ANC majority look much sounder as a result.
Expect the ANC to get about 46 seats in the 73-seat legislature, with the DP installing itself as the official opposition, with about 12 seats.
Gauteng will give the NNP some of its worst news in what looks to be a miserable week for the party, as its tally of seats seems set to fall from the 21 gained in 1994 to about four on Wednesday.
The Azanian People’s Organisation, the PAC and the UDM seem likely to be found yapping while the ANC caravan moves on. And the IFP’ssupport looks a lot shakier than in the past.
KwaZulu-Natal
If nothing else, the fact that most voters in the province live in urban rather than rural areas looks set to ensure a victory for the ANC. Urban and peri-urban areas are solidly controlled by the ANC, and it will take a miracle – or massive disruptions – to keep the party out of power in the province. Polls have shown that six out of 10 people in the province fear intimidation if their voting preferences are known.
Assuming a percentage poll of about 90% of registered voters, the ANC should win an absolute majority and grab about 44 of the 80 seats in the legislature, double the likely IFPtally. This outcome would clearly stamp the ANC’s authority on the coalition government the ANC and the IFPare likely to establish after the election.
Among white, coloured and Indian voters, expect gains for the DP and a fall-off in support for the NNP.
Eastern Cape
A hands-down win for the ANC, helped somewhat by the way the government suddenly managed to launch, amid great fanfare in the course of the campaign, a number of local development projects.
The main interest lies in who will play second fiddle in this large, poor province where Transkei homeboy Holomisa still has a fighting chance of making an impact despite his disappointing campaign.
Expect the ANC to win about 54 of the 63 seats in the Bisho-based legislature. Holomisa must be hoping the opinion polls have under-estimated his mainly Transkei- based support because if they haven’t, he won’t get more than two seats. This would allow the DP or NNP, likely to win about three seats each, to become the official opposition.
Northern Cape
The DP, FF and the FA have ganged up to form a small opposition bloc which they hope will enable them to hold the balance of power in South Africa’s most sparsely populated province, depending on the balance of power between the NNP and ANC.
The polls suggest their strategy will not work, as the ANC should scrape home with an absolute majority, with about 16 of the 30 seats on offer.
But the group believes it has everything to play for. The NNP, which toyed with the idea of joining it, got cold feet at the last moment.
ANC Premier Manne Dipico played a clever hand in 1994 when he offered the single DP member elected the speakership in the legislature to turn his party’s 15 seats into the slimmest of majorities. He may just have to be as crafty again.
Free State
Another resounding ANC victory. But expect it to be down a little on the scale of its success five years ago. The reason? The ANC has resorted continually to imposing new leaders on the fractious local party to calm it down, instead of resolving the internecine dynamics. Ivy Matsepe- Casaburri, brought in to replace Patrick “Terror” Lekota in 1996, was no solution. And Winkie Direko, brought in now as the ANC premier candidate, is even less likely to end the infighting.
Her first act was to seek the wholesale deletion from the party’s election lists of all members of one faction implicated in local struggles.
This has created opportunities for the PAC and the UDM, though it is unlikely they will succeed in fully exploiting them.
Each seems unlikely to gain more than two seats, against the ANC’s probable 23, in the 30-seat assembly.
Mpumalanga
Another emphatic ANC victory – even though the ANC has removed from the premiership anti-corruption champion Mathews Phosa and rewarded those he alleged were lining their pockets at taxpayers’ expense with prominent positions on the provincial list.
His handpicked successor, former homeland leader Johannes Mahlangu, has not exactly inspired the locals.
How this will play itself out is unclear. But the UDM, with perhaps two seats, could establish itself as the official opposition in place of the NNP.
The DP could be a newcomer in the legislature, and the FF looks set to retain a toehold there.
Northern Province
Expect the biggest walkover of the lot for the ANC – despite bitter infighting that cost Premier Ngoako Ramathlodi the party chair, and the fury of 170 000 highly politicised voters in Bushbuckridge who want incorporation into Mpumalanga.
On a far smaller scale, the Reverend Kenneth Meshoe’s ACDP could pick up a couple of seats in the Bible belt around Pietersburg, and the DP looks like displacing the NNP and FF as the main parties among whites.
The FA may also benefit from agreements it has struck with local black ethnic parties.
North-West
The North-West has long been good fossil territory, and Wednesday may see the recovery of another one – the former president of erstwhile Bophuthatswana, Lucas Mangope.
He looks set to return to mainstream politics if poll predictions of support for his United Christian Democratic Party prove well founded. His party could just pick up two provincial seats and may rival the DP in the race to become the official opposition there.
But Premier Popo Molefe’s ANC will be overwhelmingly dominant, with perhaps 28 of the 33 seats on offer.
Compiled by Justin Arenstein, Howard Barrell, Peter Dickson, Selby Makgotho, Wally Mbhele, Makhosini Nkosi, Ivor Powell and Tara Turkington