Elections 2021: ANC weighing options ahead of coalition talks

It’s only a matter of time before the African National Congress (ANC) holds coalition talks with other parties, but treasurer-general Paul Mashatile says they have learnt their lesson from the previous local government elections, which were held in 2016, and will be treading carefully this time around. The overall national vote for the ANC is at 46% and the party has failed to win several municipalities with an outright majority.

ANC NEC member Jeff Radebe has been deployed to KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), where he will lead a team to negotiate coalitions in province, where the party has suffered losses in some areas.

ANC on coalitions: ‘Nothing is off the table’

Paul Mashatile was alongside ANC deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte at the IEC results centre in Tshwane on Wednesday, 3 November 2021, when he said South Africans should start understanding that coalition governments are the go-to solution in the current political environment.

Mashatile also admitted that coalitions aren’t easy to go into and that the ANC is currently weighing its options as to which parties to approach.

“Coalitions are messy if you start on the wrong footing, that’s why we are carefully considering how we are going to go into it. First, when we go into government we want to deliver services to our people, therefore we must choose to work with those who will be helping us to pursue that agenda. If we approach it that way it won’t be messy because it’s not a marriage of convenience, we agree on a programme, we pursue that programme together.”

ANC Treasurer-general Paul Mashatile

Duarte says for now, nothing is off the table as far as the types of coalitions they go into are concerned.

“Coalitions are about compromises and we will be principled without compromising legacy principles of the ANC. So that’s the kind of discussion we will be happy to have with any political party,” she said.