South Africans cast ballots on Wednesday in local elections broadly regarded as a judgment on the African National Congress, the party that led the country out of white minority rule in 1994 but has seen its support steadily decline over the past decade.
Polling stations opened at 7am (05:00 GMT) and were due to close at 9pm (19:00 GMT). A record 29.2 million people are registered to vote at 23,696 voting stations, according to the Electoral Commission of South Africa, and more than 1.4 million special votes were cast on Monday and Tuesday.
Voters are choosing councils for the country's eight metropolitan municipalities, 44 district councils and 205 local councils. Those councils in turn select mayors.
The ANC dropped below 50 percent in municipal polls for the first time in 2021. In the 2024 national election it lost its parliamentary majority and was pushed into a coalition government with the Democratic Alliance and other parties. Polls suggest its support could now fall below 40 percent.
President Cyril Ramaphosa acknowledged the party's troubles in his weekly newsletter, From the Desk of the President, saying that "municipal failures have contributed to declining public trust and confidence in democratic governance". The presidency said Ramaphosa would vote at Hyde Park High School in Johannesburg.
Johannesburg is the biggest prize in this election. The country's financial capital has had five mayors in four years. The Democratic Alliance has fielded its 75-year-old former leader, Helen Zille, for the city's top job. Her campaign stunts included snorkelling in a mud-filled trench flooded by a burst municipal water pipe. A News24 poll placed Zille at 36 percent, meaning she would need coalition partners, particularly the ANC, to govern. Zille told the Associated Press that the ANC was "in free fall".
The vote is also the first local election for former President Jacob Zuma's uMkhonto weSizwe party, which is mounting a strong challenge in the coastal city of Durban. "We are going to start by taking back our country here," Zuma told supporters in the city on Sunday, the AFP news agency reported. Durban has become a centre of anti-migrant sentiment, a prominent theme in the campaign.
Turnout may be a concern, as only 46 percent of registered voters participated in the 2021 municipal elections. Coalition government is already widespread: 74 of the country's 257 municipalities were run by coalitions or minority administrations as of February, according to the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection.
Security has been tightened, with police saying 21 election-related cases have been recorded since Sunday. KwaZulu-Natal has 165 voting stations classed as high risk, the most of any province. Final results are expected on Sunday and are likely to shape the race to succeed Ramaphosa as ANC leader at the party's conference in December 2027.
