South Africa’s local government elections on November 4 will be read closely by investors and market-watchers as a test of whether the country’s municipalities, the institutions that deliver water, power and sanitation to businesses and households alike, can be governed more stably in the years ahead of the 2029 general election.
The stakes are considerable. More than 29 million people are registered to vote, and the results, due from Sunday, are likely to reinforce the trend towards coalition governments and test whether such arrangements can produce stable local councils. Since the last municipal elections, no party was able to hold a majority in just under a third of the 257 councils, according to research by the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection. By February 2026, 74 municipalities were governed by coalitions or minority administrations, a fragmented ownership picture of the country’s local infrastructure and service apparatus.
The economic grievances driving the vote are stark. High unemployment, running at 33 percent, crumbling infrastructure and unreliable basic services rank among the top concerns. In Durban, 27-year-old Nikesh Nunkoo said water cuts in his neighbourhood of Shallcross could last anywhere from three days to two weeks. Having voted in three previous elections, he was still weighing whether to cast a ballot this time. “I don’t have any hope that things would be better in the next five years,” he said.
By contrast, in Cape Town’s deprived township of Khayelitsha, where thousands live in informal shacks with no sanitation, 53-year-old Ntombekhaya Makeleni stopped using the communal toilets after a group of men tried to force their way in as she was inside one day before dawn. She now relies on a bucket that is emptied outside later, as do many others. “I will be voting because after voting, things will be fixed,” she told AFP.
The political marketplace itself has become crowded and fragmented. More than 500 parties are registered with the electoral commission, reflecting eroding support for traditional powerhouses such as the African National Congress (ANC) of late anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela. An Ipsos survey published in March found nearly half of South Africans felt no political party represented their views, while only 38 percent believed their municipality was doing its job well.
The ANC’s market share of political support has been in structural decline. For the first time since democracy in 1994, the party slid under the symbolic 50-percent threshold in the 2021 local elections, and it lost its national parliamentary majority in 2024. The second-largest party, the liberal Democratic Alliance (DA), governs Cape Town and has run a determined campaign for Johannesburg, playing up the failures of the ANC-led council running the economic hub. A newcomer to local elections is ex-president Jacob Zuma’s MK party, which secured third place in the previous national polls.
Yet even in DA-run Cape Town, the contrast between affluent suburbs and poorer townships remains stark three decades after the end of apartheid. “Residents, especially in townships, are not asking for much. They want basic services,” political commentator Kuhle Zwakala of Stellenbosch University said. “To be talking about electricity, water and sanitation issues 30 years into democracy is a shame.”
Meanwhile, not all voters will be swayed by service delivery performance, said Oscar van Heerden, a senior research fellow at the Centre for African Diplomacy and Leadership. “There is also an identity factor,” he told AFP, noting enduring support for the ANC in historically black townships and for the DA among the white electorate.
For younger South Africans without liberation-era loyalties and most affected by the 33 percent unemployment rate, voting seems pointless. Ntokozo Mthethwa, a 21-year-old IT student from Durban’s Umlazi township, doubted any party could deliver on its promises. “I see no future for me here,” he said. Nkanyiso Hadebe, 24, who lives in an informal settlement in Durban’s Chatsworth area, was equally clear: “I will not vote because voting changes nothing.”
Turnout will be a key factor on Wednesday. Only 46 percent of registered voters cast ballots in the 2021 local elections, compared with 58.6 percent in the 2024 polls, and how many show up this time will help shape the coalition landscape that governs the country’s municipal economies.