As we draw nearer to South Africa’s local government elections in November, it’s worth taking a closer look at one of the parties’ key forms of communication with voters: election posters.
While some political commentators still point to manifestos as a useful tool for understanding a party or candidate’s plans in more depth, others argue these lengthy documents have little influence on a majority of voters.
Far more people heading to the polls are likely to engage with the messages of election posters. In the last municipal election, the ANC reportedly printed 100,000 posters for Cape Town alone which represented a major cost around electioneering for the party.
Though my focus is on the post-ers visible in the Joburg metro area, a recent trip passing through the North West province and Limpopo showed that posters had also been distributed in smaller towns including Northam, Brits and Bojating.
It’s worth breaking down in more detail what these posters are saying through their words and visuals. Posters are a unique opportunity to connect with voters, and choices around language and graphics are constrained by how quickly readers will pass by, either on foot, by car or taxi.
This means they lend themselves to shorter messages and clear, recognisable images. I analyse two posters per political party in order of prominence following the last municipal election below.
ANC
Many of the ANC’s posters simply read ‘Vote ANC’ which is repeated twice with the party’s logo occupying the centre of the design. ‘Vote ANC’ is an imperative sentence, meaning that it is issuing a command. This is one way to engage the audience which is the implied subject of the instruction and being told how to vote.
The simple arrangement of the text is visually striking in the ANC’s recognisable colours of green and yellow. The design seems to be relying on the party’s name and history, with the prominent colour scheme and logo that features symbols which are tied to the armed struggle and unity against oppression.
The poster is generic and does not make any references to Joburg, the party’s mayoral candidate or its policies.
Another of the party’s posters features President Cyril Ramaphosa with the words ‘Let’s continue building better communities together’. The designers have chosen to feature the sitting president of South Africa, rather than a candidate for mayor.
This once again seems to be centring the party’s history and relying on a prominent figure to secure votes.
In the image, the president is shown smiling at the camera and wearing a suit, contrasting with the party’s posters for their manifesto launch where the President was pictured in a collared shirt in the party’s colours.
The text is also engaging the audience, but this time comes across more like an invitation than an order with the use of ‘let’s’ and ‘together’. In this case, the ‘us’ in ‘let’s’ is inclusive, referring to the party and its voters. ‘Continue’ in this case makes the assumption that the ANC and its voters have already contributed towards ‘building better communities’. As in the example above, this has no reference to Joburg.
DA
The DA’s post-ers both mention ‘work’. In the first, the text offers a simple statement which says ‘Zille works for Joburg’ with a photograph of Helen Zille with her fist in the air. Unlike the ANC, the DA has chosen to centre their mayoral candidate in both the image and text.
Since Zille ‘works’ for Joburg, this use of present tense implies that she is already working.
The word ‘works’ is also ambiguous since it could refer to being employed or to functioning well. Thus, the text could be interpreted to mean that Zille is labouring (‘Zille works hard’) or that she is the right candidate for mayor (‘Zille works well’).
The raised fist is a common symbol of triumph over adversity and is used to represent resistance, solidarity and defiance against injustice by many groups, including Black Consciousness, feminist and workers’ rights movements.
Its use on this poster could symbolise victory and power, reference struggle for a party with no anti-apartheid history, or perhaps even mark the ANC as the ‘unjust authority’ against which Zille is protesting. The fist reaches up towards the top of the poster over a picture of a waving South African flag, a symbol of unity and nationalism.
The DA’s other common poster reads ‘Get Joburg working for all’. Again, the use of ‘working’ could potentially refer to employment (‘Get jobs for all in Joburg’) or more likely to getting the city’s services to function well.
This makes the assumption that Joburg isn’t working at the moment, most probably in reference to service delivery issues which have been the subject of Zille’s viral antics in the lead up to the elections. Again, the language involves the reader through a command.
This poster is simplified and does not have much imagery except for the DA’s royal blue and the national flag. The DA has nowhere chosen to reference the fact that the party previously governed the city under Herman Mashaba.
ActionSA
Many of ActionSA’s posters read ‘Gatvol? Let us fix it’ on a bright green background. This text engages the reader using a different tactic, firstly by asking a question and secondly by using a colloquialism and a conversational tone.
In comparison to the ANC posters, this ‘us’ in ‘Let us’ is exclusive and refers to the party.
In a sense, it is asking permission from voters to allow ActionSA to assist them.
Once again, the text assumes that there is something ‘broken’ in need of fixing, though it does not explicitly refer to Joburg.
Another approach in their posters makes use of an image of national leader Herman Mashaba with the main text reading ‘Mashaba for mayor’ and then a sub-heading of ‘Let’s do it again’. This refers to the fact that Mashaba has held the position of mayor of Joburg before as a member of the DA.
This is left purposely vague on what ‘it’ is that Mashaba did as mayor that might be worth doing ‘again’.
EFF
The EFF also has a simple poster with the primary text reading ‘Vote EFF’ on their trademark red background featuring an image of national leader Julius Malema.
The poster is also informative, noting the date of the elections on 4 November.
Below this in smaller font is the phrase ‘Victory or death’ – which has references to military battle cries going back to ancient Greece and Rome as well as the American Revolution.
The EFF often positions itself as ‘revolutionary’ so perhaps this should come as no surprise.
A less prominent poster includes an image of EFF mayoral candidate Tlaleng Mofokeng and reads above her image ‘Johannesburg metro’ and below ‘Mayoral candidate Dr Tlaleng Mofokeng’.
Tlaleng Mofokeng is quite well-known and the text has chosen to emphasise that she is a doctor.
BOSA
BOSA has the most linguistically and visually complex poster. They have chosen to include a picture of both national leader Mmusi Maimane and mayoral candidate Nobuntu Hlazo-Webster.
The text at the top of the poster reads ‘They broke Joburg’ in green font on a yellow background, ostensibly referring to the ANC and making the accusation that Joburg has been ‘broken’ under their leadership. Underneath this is ‘They will sell Joburg’ in white text on blue, referring to the DA and perhaps their economic policies.
Then, there is ‘We will build Joburg’ in white on a black background, referring to BOSA and their full name of Build One South Africa. In another version, BOSA has chosen a simpler message of ‘Build Joburg’ followed by ‘Vote Nobuntu’ with an image of their mayoral candidate. Again, this is referencing the party’s full name and the positive connotations of ‘building’ or creating something.
The construction of the sentence also functions as an imperative or command, this time not to vote but to build something.
BOSA has chosen to focus on Joburg and to refer to the candidate using her first name, possibly to signal familiarity and make the connection to the audience feel more personal.
Translation
I want to end with a short note on translation. I can only understand English and Afrikaans, but there are some interesting choices parties such as the DA have made in their seemingly bilingual posters which often appear together.
Their first reads ‘Kry Joburg aan die werk vir almal’ which is a version of ‘Get Joburg working for all’. In the Afrikaans, this sounds somewhat clumsy, however – possibly a sign of trying to directly translate the construction of the sentence from the English.
A more fluent translation might have been ‘Laat Joburg vir almal werk’.
The DA’s other poster reads ‘Zille werk vir almal in Joburg’ – literally ‘Zille works for everyone in Joburg’. The addition of ‘for everyone’ in the Afrikaans version compared to the English is a departure from the above where the creators have tried to strictly translate word for word.
It’s unclear why it would be important to include ‘for everyone’ here, except as a signal that the DA also works for Afrikaans-speaking voters in particular since, again, the English and Afrikaans versions often appear together on the street.
Lee-Anne Gaertner is a writer and editor who works at the intersection of human rights and communications at the Centre for Applied Legal Studies based at Wits University.