A fierce political battle has erupted between the African National Congress (ANC) and the Congress of the People (Cope) to win the Eastern Cape, which was also the birthplace of famed anti-apartheid leaders.
Homes to both former presidents Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki, the Eastern Cape boasts a strong anti-apartheid legacy, and has been a stronghold of the ANC for decades.
But the emergence of Cope — which launched its election campaign in the province on Saturday — has seen the ANC losing members, threatening the party’s grip on the region since apartheid ended in 1994.
The ANC also launched its manifesto in the Eastern Cape earlier this month, highlighting the province’s historic significance.
But analysts say voters don’t care about the region’s legacy — they want the government to bring services to ensure a better future.
“History will have no influence in this year’s voting in the Eastern Cape. Service delivery seems to have eluded this part of the country, people are frustrated,” said independent political analyst Somadoda Fikeni.
The ANC is promising to speed up rural development and encourage investment, but after 15 years in power, some voters are questioning if the party can deliver.
“Reduction of poverty in the Eastern Cape has been largely in the form of social grants” rather than job-generating investments, said Derek Luyt, of the Public Service Accountability Monitor based in the province.
Conditions remain particularly bad in the former homelands, the group says.
“But to take conditions under apartheid as a baseline for development in the province is to set the bar way too low, and the fact is that service delivery in the Eastern Cape remains, at best, patchy and uneven,” said Luyt.
According to the organisation, more than 60% of the province’s 6,9-million people live below the official poverty line.
Cope has also placed fighting poverty and improving health and education services high on it election promises, in a bid to wrest disgruntled voters from the ANC.
But the party acknowledges that the upcoming polls will be a crucial test of strength in the province where it claims its largest support base.
“So far the Eastern Cape is our stronghold, but only the vote will qualify that,” said Cope official Onkgopotse Tabane.
The majority of Cope members in the Eastern Cape are ANC dissidents who resigned when the ANC axed Mbeki in September.
The increasing support in the province put to rest perceptions that Cope was a party for the elite, Tabane told Agence France-Presse.
“We identify with the poor,” he said.
The province’s endemic poverty is particularly concentrated in the rural areas, which gave birth to leaders like Mandela, Mbeki and the late ANC leader, Oliver Tambo.
In some parts of the province, schoolchildren learn under trees. Health services are underdeveloped, and last year, 80 babies died over three months due to bad tap water in one district.
“The focus should be on rural development of this province, which has been neglected in the past. Poverty is most rife in these areas,” said Thabisi Hoeane, an analyst at Rhodes University.
In addition to the province’s voting strength, its anti-apartheid legacy heightens its importance for both parties as they try to claim the mantle of the liberation struggle, he said.
The ANC acknowledges that the war against poverty has not yet been won, but notes progress in providing electricity and housing.
“We have not failed entirely in delivering services, but some areas still lag behind,” said ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe. — AFP