South Africa is holding its breath. A day after Wednesday’s local elections on 4 November, the ballot boxes are delivering their first verdicts and sketching a political landscape more fragmented than ever. The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) has set Sunday, 8 November, as the date for the official declaration, while counting, capturing and verification continue across the country.
One thing stands out already: the electoral machinery is running faster than five years ago. By 9am on Thursday, eighteen municipalities had completed the entire results process, a pace the IEC describes as quicker than at the previous municipal polls.
By midday, roughly a third of the 23,696 voting districts had reported. On the ward ballot, the ANC stood at 32.0%, closely followed by the Democratic Alliance (DA) on 27.8%. Further back, former president Jacob Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP) had 6.5%, just ahead of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF). Provisional turnout sits at around 51%, according to the IEC.
Those national averages hide sharply different regional pictures. The Western Cape remains a DA stronghold, with the party close to 53% there, and it also leads in Gauteng with nearly 38%. KwaZulu-Natal, for its part, is swinging towards the MKP, which has more than 32% in its first municipal campaign. Everywhere else the ANC holds first place, with its best provisional score in Limpopo, above 52%.
The real contest is in the metros. In Gauteng, the country’s economic heartland, the DA is ahead in most municipalities, the exception being Tshwane, where ActionSA has edged in front. Johannesburg, worn down for years by water and power cuts, is a major test for every party. In eThekwini, the greater Durban metro, no figures had been published by Thursday noon, yet the fight promises to be fierce. DA mayoral candidate Hanniff Hoosen has already ruled out any deal with the MKP, while Duduzane Zuma says the party is aiming for a two-thirds majority.
The first councils to finish counting confirm the trend towards fragmentation. In the Northern Cape, the ANC claimed the first officially declared win, taking 52.54% in Ward 3 of Kamiesberg. Yet of the fourteen local councils already fully counted in the province, only five produced a clear majority. The remaining nine will have to negotiate.
The vote also unfolded under close watch. In KwaZulu-Natal, police opened eighteen election-related cases and made seven arrests. Unused ballots were stolen from a voting station in Hillcrest, which the IEC says cannot be used to tamper with the result, and two people were arrested in the Eastern Cape for posing as electoral officials.
Thirty-two years after the end of apartheid, Nelson Mandela’s party remains the country’s largest political force, but it no longer rules unchallenged. If Sunday’s figures confirm the trend, many South African cities will enter a fresh round of bargaining, where the ability to build stable coalitions will matter as much as the votes won.
Provisional figures as of midday on 5 November 2026, subject to change.