IFP takes Ulundi, but ANC has Cape Town

IFP wins thumping majority in Ulundi

There remains uncertainty about which parties will rule KwaZulu-Natal after an inconclusive result from Wednesday’s provincial election — but the Inkatha Freedom Party swept its traditional capital in Ulundi with 93,6%.

The town is the traditional capital of the Zulu nation and was the site of a major battle with the British in 1879.

The IFP, led by outgoing Minister of Home Affairs Mangosuthu Buthelezi, won 59 948 votes in the town while its nearest rival, the ANC, notched up only 2 319 or 3,62%.

Next in line was the DA, which won 690 votes or 1,08%.

Meanwhile, intense negotiations are expected between the IFP and its alliance partner, the DA, and the ANC over which parties should rule the province as a whole — where in previous elections the IFP has been predominant — with neither of the groupings able to rule on their own.

ANC wins Cape Town in poll

The African National Congress snatched political control of the City of Cape Town metropolitan council two years ago when the New National Party councillors defected from the Democratic Alliance — but now the national ruling party has won the most votes of any party in the city.

Wednesday’s election results — while representing the provincial vote for the Western Cape legislature from the Cape Town area — show that if an election were held tomorrow the ANC would most likely emerge as the overall winner.

The ANC pulled in 454 282 votes or 44,09% of the vote — which, if translated into a system that is half ward councillors and half proportional representation, would probably ensure it victory in the 200-seat council.

Municipal elections are scheduled for late in 2005. In the municipal election of 2000 the DA won a majority in the new metro. It was the only metro council not ruled by the ANC at the time in the country.

The DA gained 280 266 votes or 27,2% in the metro and Patricia de Lille’s Independent Democrats won 82 749 or 8,03% – just behind the NNP’s 10,83% or 111 548.

The African Christian Democratic Party got 3,74% of the vote on Wednesday in South Africa’s Mother City and other parties which would get seats if a municipal poll were held tomorrow include the Pan Africanist Congress, the Freedom Front Plus and the African Muslim Party.

ANC celebrates

Several hundred ANC supporters and special guests converged on the Sandton Convention Centre on Friday evening to celebrate the party’s landslide election victory.

Many wore colourful clothes, and a couple sounded plastic trumpets typical of soccer matches.

Elias Legwet, who came from Carletoneville where he had been a door-to-door canvasser, said he felt “great”.

“We were never in danger of not winning,” he said. “Now there will be a better life for all.”

Inside the centre spiritual leader Patriarch Paulus of Ethiopia, dressed in white robes and wearing gold clerical chains, added colour to the party.

Paulus, who heads the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, is on a visit to South Africa where he has 5 000 congregants.

Commenting on this week’s election, which he has been following, he said: “I feel joyful that it was a peaceful election because they — South Africans — are all my brothers and sisters.

“I am not a politician but I feel joyful. I have great admiration for those in office, but my greatest admiration was for the peacefulness.”

A Sapa correspondent said there was plenty of food at the victory party.

A “fairly strong police presence” was visible both inside and outside the centre.

‘IFP/DA alliance will be broken’

The IFP/DA Coalition for Change will not see the light of day after the final results of the 2004 national elections are declared, University of South Africa political analyst Dirk Kotze said on Friday.

“It’s almost self-evident that that will be the case. The DA and IFP alliance will be broken,” he said, adding that it remains to be seen if the DA made inroads into black voters, particularly in traditional ANC strongholds.

Discussing the situation in KwaZulu-Natal, Kotze said: “No one has the majority vote, so the IFP and the ANC will form a coalition to govern in that province. For the IFP, the DA did not bring something and therefore the alliance did not produce a breakthrough.”

The ANC was leading all the political parties in KwaZulu-Natal with 45,83% after 96% of the votes cast were counted by 1.30pm on Friday.

It was followed by the IFP with 38,31% and the DA, which garnered 7,94%. The Freedom Front Plus managed to occupy the fourth spot with 0,29%.

Nationally, the ANC collected a massive vote, which gave it a 69,67% lead, followed by the DA with 12,45%, the IFP with 6,76% and the United Democratic Movement with 2,31%.

By early afternoon, votes had been fully captured in the Northern Cape and the Western Cape. In Limpopo, the tally was at 99,82% and in Mpumalanga 99,9%. The Eastern Cape followed with 98,59%, with counting in all the other provinces at least 90% complete.

DA’s Leon acknowledges poll’s strong ANC mandate

DA leader Tony Leon has acknowledged that the results of the election has given the ruling ANC a strong mandate, and has sounded a conciliatory note by congratulating Mbeki on the ANC victory and a well-run campaign.

The election saw the DA improve its support from the 1999 national election, where it won 9,56% of the vote and 38 seats in the National Assembly. Should the latest results from the 2004 poll stand, the DA will increase its National Assembly seats to about 50 out of the total of 400.

Writing in the DA’s weekly South Africa Today newsletter on Friday, Leon said the DA had earned the right to celebrate.

“We have achieved an historic result — one that lays the foundation for a strong, positive alternative government to the ANC in South Africa. Our support has increased dramatically from the 1999 election. Then, we won 9,56% of the national vote or 1 527 337 votes. Five years later, we have increased our support substantially.

“This is, in itself, a significant milestone. Afro-pessimists will be confounded by the fact of a growing and viable opposition. We project that we will add 500 000 votes to the 1999 national tally, and break through the two million mark — an increase of roughly 33%.”

The DA had improved its results in every province, added Leon.

Leon said the election results have highlighted that there are now only two major political forces in South Africa: the DA and its allies, and the ANC and its allies. Both of these appear to have increased their national percentages by about 3% of the total.

Speaking for the DA, he said he “looked forward to sincere, vigorous and sensible debates between our two parties over the next five years about the issues that matter most”.

Commenting on the results of the NNP, he said: “As we predicted, the voters have dealt the NNP a fatal blow. They have been reduced to less than 2% nationwide. In the Western Cape they are hovering at around 10%. They sold out the voters, and the voters have taken their revenge.”

“Our mission is to build an alternative to the ANC government. Not because we dislike the ANC; they are our political rivals, not our enemies. Indeed, I am sure that our maturing democracy requires a sensible and balanced relationship between the government and the opposition,” Leon added.

“We also remain committed to our continued relationship with the Inkatha Freedom Party — our partners in the Coalition for Change. Together, we will drive forward our agenda for positive change by creating jobs, fighting crime, combating HIV/Aids and lifting people out of poverty,” Leon concluded.

ANC will not disappoint, says Mbeki

Mbeki on Friday praised the millions of South Africans who voted for the ANC on Wednesday, and pledged the party would not disappoint them.

Writing in the ANC’s online publication, ANC Today, Mbeki said the people had voted overwhelmingly for national unity and reconciliation.

“They voted to unite in action in a people’s contract, together to create jobs, to fight poverty and build a better life for all,” he said.

“Through the ballot box, they have spoken out loudly against all attempts to persuade them that they belong to separate compartments, with competing interests.

“They have spoken loudly and said they have understood the truths the ANC has communicated to them, and understood the falsehoods that others have told.”

The ANC’s detractors, by trying to obliterate the memory of the racist past and denying its sustained impact on the present and the future, attempted to attribute to the ANC and the democratic order all the problems inherited from the past.

“Unashamedly, they pretend that these problems, that are many centuries old, could have been solved in a mere 10 years, and that failure to solve them constitutes an avoidable failure of our movement,” he said.

The ANC will continue working to eradicate the poverty and under-development still being experienced by the poor, which was the legacy of colonialism and apartheid, and could not be solved in 10 years.

This includes creating more jobs; reducing poverty; building a non-racial and non-sexist South Africa, with sustained reduction of

the racial and gender disparities; reinforcing national unity and reconciliation; and further extending the frontiers of knowledge and culture.

The ANC will also work for a heightened contribution to the “victory of the African renaissance and the emergence of a just world”.