General elections will be held in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

in 2024 to elect a new

National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repre ...

as well as the

provincial legislature In South Africa, a provincial legislature is the legislative branch of the government of a province.'' Chapter 6: Provinces'', Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996. The provincial legislatures are unicameral and vary in size from 30 ...

in each province. These will be the seventh elections held under the conditions of universal adult suffrage since the end of the

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

era in 1994. The new

National Council of Provinces The National Council of Provinces (NCOP) is the upper house of the Parliament of South Africa under the (post-apartheid) constitution which came into full effect in 1997. It replaced the former Senate, but is very similar to that body, and to ma ...

will be elected at the first sitting of each provincial legislature. Ever since the first post-apartheid election in 1994, the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a Social democracy, social-democratic political party in Republic of South Africa, South Africa. A liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid, it has governed the country since 1994, when ...

has held a majority of seats in the National Assembly and thus governed alone, with the exceptions of the Government of National Unity from 1994 to 1999 and from 1999 to 2004 with the

Inkatha Freedom Party The Inkatha Freedom Party ( zu, IQembu leNkatha yeNkululeko, IFP) is a right-wing political party in South Africa. The party has been led by Velenkosini Hlabisa since the party's 2019 National General Conference. Mangosuthu Buthelezi founded t ...

Background

In the 2021 municipal elections, the

got under 50% of the vote for the first time nationwide in any election. The party also lost support in the key metros of Tshwane (Pretoria),

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a megacity, and is one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. According to Demo ...

, Ekurhuleni, and eThekwini (Durban). The ANC retained control of eThekwini while the Democratic Alliance managed to take control of Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni through a majority coalition and a minority coalition respectively in addition to forming a majority coalition government in Tshwane, which it had ruled since 2016. In early 2023, the ANC and

Economic Freedom Fighters The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) is a South African left-wing to far-left pan-Africanist and Marxist–Leninist political party. It was founded by expelled former African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) President Julius Malema, and hi ...

formed a coalition in Johannesburg and Ekurhuleni where the two parties hold MMC positions whilst electing a mayor from a minority party. In April 2023, noting the prospects of an ANC/EFF national coalition, the DA leader

John Steenhuisen John Henry Steenhuisen (born 25 March 1976) is a South African politician who has served as the leader of the Opposition since October 2019 and has been the federal leader of the Democratic Alliance since November 2020, having served as the in ...

called for "like-minded" parties to join together to prevent a "doomsday coalition". In July 2023 a joint statement by the Democratic Alliance (DA),

(IFP),

ActionSA ActionSA is a South African political party established by former mayor of Johannesburg, Herman Mashaba, soon after he left the Democratic Alliance. The party states that it has been established to "set South Africa free from the restraints of ...

, Freedom Front Plus (FF Plus), the

United Independent Movement The United Independent Movement (UIM) is a South African political party founded by Neil de Beer, former national security advisor to Nelson Mandela and a former uMkhonto we Sizwe operative. Formation The party initially formed as a civil soc ...

(UIM) and the

Spectrum National Party The Spectrum National Party (SNP) is a South African list of political parties in South Africa, political party founded in 2019 by Christopher Claasen, a businessman and pastor. The party failed to garner the minimum number of signatures requi ...

(SNP) was released announcing a convention on 16 and 17 August proposing a national coalition in the event of a hung parliament. On 17 August 2023 a pre-election agreement called the Multi-Party Charter was signed between the parites as well as the

Independent South African National Civic Organisation The South African National Civics Organisation or South African National Civic Organisation (SANCO) is an umbrella political organisation in South Africa. It was founded in March 1992 to coordinate among existing civic organisations, which had be ...

, with the aim of presenting a united front against the two decade rule of the

(ANC) party, and the recent rise of the controversial

(EFF) party. On 7 October 2023, the

African Christian Democratic Party African or Africans may refer to: * Anything from or pertaining to the continent of Africa: ** People who are native to Africa, descendants of natives of Africa, or individuals who trace their ancestry to indigenous inhabitants of Africa *** Ethn ...

(ACDP) announced it would be joining the charter increasing the charter's seat count from 108 to 112 in the 400 seat

Electoral system

South Africa has a

parliamentary system of government A parliamentary system, or parliamentarian democracy, is a system of democratic governance of a state (or subordinate entity) where the executive derives its democratic legitimacy from its ability to command the support ("confidence") of the ...

. The

President of South Africa The president of South Africa is the head of state and head of government of the Republic of South Africa. The president heads the executive branch of the Government of South Africa and is the commander-in-chief of the South African Nationa ...

is unusual among heads of state of countries with a parliamentary system in that the President is also the

head of government The head of government is the highest or the second-highest official in the executive branch of a sovereign state, a federated state, or a self-governing colony, autonomous region, or other government who often presides over a cabinet, a gro ...

, with executive functions. In June 2020, the Constitutional Court ruled in ''New Nation Movement NPC v President of the Republic of South Africa'' that the Electoral Act was unconstitutional to the extent that it did not allow independents to contest national and provincial elections. Since the first elections held under

universal suffrage Universal suffrage (also called universal franchise, general suffrage, and common suffrage of the common man) gives the right to vote to all adult citizens, regardless of wealth, income, gender, social status, race, ethnicity, or political stanc ...

, 400 members elected were elected to the National Assembly by a system of

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...

with a

closed list Closed list describes the variant of party-list systems where voters can effectively only vote for political parties as a whole; thus they have no influence on the party-supplied order in which party candidates are elected. If voters had some inf ...

approach. Two hundred members were elected from national party lists, while the other 200 were elected from provincial party lists in each of the

nine provinces The term Nine Provinces or Nine Regions (), is used in ancient Chinese histories to refer to territorial divisions or islands during the Xia and Shang dynasties and has now come to symbolically represent China. "Province" is the word used to t ...

. The national list seats were awarded by subtracting seats won at the provincial level from each party's national allocation to generate a maximally proportional result. The

Droop quota The Droop quota is the quota most commonly used in elections held under the single transferable vote (STV) system. It is also sometimes used in elections held under the largest remainder method of party-list proportional representation (list PR). ...

variant of the

largest remainder method The largest remainder method (also known as Hare–Niemeyer method, Hamilton method or as Vinton's method) is one way of allocating seats proportionally for representative assemblies with party list voting systems. It contrasts with various h ...

was used to allocate seats at both the national and provincial levels. Provincial legislatures were also elected by a system of proprotional representation with closed party lists. In February 2021, Home Affairs Minister

Aaron Motsoaledi Pakishe Aaron Motsoaledi (born 7 August 1958, in Transvaal, now Limpopo) is the Minister of Home Affairs in the Cabinet of South Africa. He was previously the Minister of Health from 2009 to 2019. He was a MEC in Limpopo province for agriculture ...

appointed a ministerial advisory committee led by

Valli Moosa Mohammed Valli Moosa (born 8 February 1957 in Johannesburg) is a retired South African politician who was active in the United Democratic Front. Political career In the early 1990s, he participated for the ANC in the negotiations to end apart ...

to recommend a new electoral system. While the committee was divided, a slim majority of members favoured a hybrid system with half of the seats elected in constituencies and the other half elected through

party lists An electoral list is a grouping of candidates for election, usually found in proportional or mixed electoral systems, but also in some plurality electoral systems. An electoral list can be registered by a political party (a party list) or can ...

. On 17 April 2023, president Cyril Ramaphosa signed the Electoral Amendment Bill into law allowing independent candidates to stand for election to the National Assembly and provincial legislatures while keeping the proportional representation with closed lists. Two hundred members will be elected from national party lists, while the remaining 200 seats will be contested by political parties and independent candidates in each of the nine provinces. In provincial legislatures, the single-tier multimember proportional system will continue to apply with political parties and independent candidates contesting for seats. Voters will receive three ballot papers as opposed to two in previous elections; the first ballot will be to elect the 200 members of the National Assembly only contested by political parties and the second ballot will be to elect the remaining 200 members of the National Assembly which will be contested by political parties and independent candidates in each of the nine provinces while the third ballot will be to elect members of the provincial legislatures with political parties and independent candidates as well. Following the election, the President of South Africa will be elected by the National Assembly. Although the President is required to be a member of the National Assembly at the time of election, a person that is elected as President must resign their seat in order to assume office. The premiers of each province will also be elected by the respective provincial legislatures after the election. The

(NCOP) comprises 90 members, ten elected by each of the provincial legislatures in proportion to the composition of the legislature. The NCOP members will be sworn in the day after the first sitting of the National Assembly.

Issues

Energy crisis

Rolling blackouts, or "loadshedding", caused by problems with the state utility Eskom has been around since 2007, however the prevalence of blackouts have increased substantially since 2020.

Opinion polls

Notes

References

{{South African elections

General elections in South Africa

General A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of highest military ranks, high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry. In some usages the term "general officer" refers t ...