Eight votes. That was the margin by which the Democratic Alliance beat the ANC in a by-election in Ward 28, Evaton West, in Emfuleni, Sedibeng. Both parties finished on 32%, and the result made the DA the winner of a Gauteng township ward for the first time.
Maki Tshabalala will now serve as the DA’s first ward councillor in such a ward. In the 90-seat Emfuleni council the ANC drops to 37 seats and the DA rises to 25. Every ANC councillor there is a ward councillor, Daily Maverick noted, and the DA now governs in eight of the 45 wards.
What changed since 2021
The comparison point for the last local elections is the proportional representation ballot, because an independent candidate ran in the ward race that year and was absent this time. In 2021 the ANC took just over half of the PR vote, sweeping all four PR ballots. The EFF came second, 73 votes ahead of the DA. In this by-election the DA doubled its support from that election, with 16% of the PR vote in the latest results against the ANC’s 53%, and the EFF took 12%.
In the 2024 provincial election the ANC won the ward with 46%, down from 71% in 2019. The DA was second with 19%, up from 9%, the EFF third with 14% and the uMkhonto Wesizwe party fourth with 12%.
The by-election followed trouble for the ANC. Ward councillor Cedric Davids was accused of taking money for illegal stands on private property. He left the ANC and joined a local party, Tau Dia Rora, which did not field him as its candidate. The ANC also went to the Electoral Court at the last minute to postpone the vote, citing unlawfully registered voters. The court rejected the application. MK sat the by-election out.
District by district
Water in the Wilderness Ministries decided it. The DA won it by 144 votes over the ANC, the only voting district the party carried, on a turnout of 36%. DA support there nearly doubled to 37%, while the ANC fell from 52% to 21%. The Patriotic Alliance did well only here, taking 25% for third place.
At Beverly Hills High School, the biggest district, just under one-third of voters turned out. The ANC won by 45 votes, but it slid from 52% to 34% and the DA climbed from 17% to 29%.
In Sonderwater, an ANC stronghold, the party’s share dropped from 61% to 43% while the DA rose from 8% to 29%. At the Apostolic Faith Mission district, the ANC edged the DA by a single vote. Each had one-third of the vote there. The ANC had held 49% in 2021 and the DA 15%.
Mahikeng
The ANC had a far easier night in Ward 2 in Mahikeng, North West, held after the ward councillor died suddenly. It beat the EFF by 913 votes, with 73% against 20%. Turnout in Mmabatho fell to 15% from 39% in 2021.
The next round of by-elections is on 10 June, when the Patriotic Alliance defends a seat in Swartland in the Western Cape. Local government elections are due in November.
