South Africans should brace themselves for a cacophony of coalition negotiations in the wake of the local government elections of 4 November 2026. Coalition praxis over the last five years suggests that many recent patterns of coalition associations are steadfast, yet there is intense contestation for new configurations.
The power contest will not end with the announcement of the results (see SA Coalitions Brief No. 1). In a wide range of municipalities, the results will introduce the next phase of the contest: coalition negotiations. This analysis takes stock of both coalition history and praxis, and the negotiation intentions of the main political parties. Statements by political parties may be indicative of subsequent actions. They are simultaneously understood to be filtered by the vagaries and manufactured illusions of election campaigns. Pre-election pronouncements could be meaningless.
This edition of the SA Coalitions Brief is based on my continuous coalitions monitoring project, which started in 2016, was done under the MISTRA banner from 2021 to 2025 and continued as individual scholarly project in the period since.
The negotiations to establish coalition governments, in the councils where no party achieves an outright majority in South Africa’s 257 municipalities, will have to be completed in a period of two weeks following the announcement of the election results.
The 14-day window period continues to apply, despite a 30-day alternative that features in the work-in-progress, still incomplete Coalitions Bill. The 14 days will start with the announcement of the local election results, scheduled for Sunday 8 November. If the 2021 precedent continues to apply, the window will end on Friday 20 November 2026. By this day, the new councils must have their first meeting and elect the key municipal officials, viz. the mayor, where relevant a deputy mayor, and the speaker. The district municipalities will only be constituted following the meetings of the local municipalities.
The party political ownership of the key council positions, along with which party chairs which municipal committees (comprising the municipal executive), will the reveal the de facto coalition that has been formed… even if no coalition agreement is adopted.
All newly elected councillors and parties will therefore have to be ready to confirm their coalition colours by the time of the first meeting of the new council. At the very least this meeting would have to be convened, even if the deliberations collapse under the weight of indecision or vacillating strategies – and the day of coalition reckoning may be rescheduled.
Given that party fortunes have been changing since the local elections of 2021, the 2021-2026 coalition formulae may have become obsolete. Parties may decide to align differently in new political contexts. In addition, a multitude of new political parties have emerged, and existing parties have entered the election arena, including the SA Communist Party (SACP) that now competes under own banner.
The coalition choices will reveal much about the trajectories awaiting South Africa in the national and provincial elections of 2029. Local election results generally – and those of the metropolitan municipalities specifically – have in the past been strong indicators of results in subsequent national and provincial elections. It will be important to watch whether local coalition trends also come to work in this way.
Where might the negotiations go?
Most bigger parties have been airing preferences for ongoing or new national coalition partners. The national and provincial contexts help frame local dispositions. The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), for example, in an umbrella dispensation in early 2023, cut its coalition arrangement with the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) and forced local government changes across KwaZulu-Natal. Coalitions might also converge around established likes and dislikes, affirming coalition praxis of the last five years. Another trend, as voiced by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the ANC’s Fikile Mbalula in the moment of the ANC’s candidate nomination lifeline from the Constitutional Court, was to call for the Democratic Alliance (DA) to be excluded from the Government of National Unity (GNU). The DA had supported the Electoral Commission’s original disallowance of late nominations by the ANC.
In anticipating likely local coalitions, it is useful to consider the national-provincial-local dynamics that impact on local coalition formation, especially for the case of the ANC:
While the national in South Africa does not dictate local coalition practice, the national mood can have an impact, as illustrated above. It is quite certain that there will be no national prescription, especially not in the case of the ANC. Thus, do not expect national GNU associations (in the likely event that they continue in their 2024 iteration) to be replicated locally.
Parties’ provincial leaderships may set boundaries, like the ANC in Gauteng. Provincialism may gain momentum given that President Cyril Ramaphosa entered the final stretch of his presidential term. The ANC’s provincial bases are mobilising – including using existing and prospective coalition partners to start building new provincial constituencies and majorities. In KwaZulu-Natal, eThekwini with its uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP) dynamics holds a small possibility of a keep-MKP-out alliance, in the likeness of the provincial government.
Overall, localism will rule. In each municipality that requires a multiparty government, parties like the ANC will do what it takes, make deals with whichever other party or independent, to get into or retain power. The lesson from coalition praxis in the now-concluding local government term is: local cultures, practices, friendships, relationships of trust, will bear weight in delivering the governing coalition.
Additional and cross-cutting rules that will help forge South Africa’s local coalitions include:
‘Majority mathematics’: This is a core criterion. All political parties will watch the unfolding results specific to individual councils. What is the easiest way in which a party (probably the strongest party), or alliance of parties, can establish the required outright majority? Seamless majorities with parties that are compliant and thankful to the coalition leading party will be the ultimate prize. In most cases in the recent past, enduring governing coalitions converged around the strongest party in a council, rather than a collection of mid-range parties. The coalition was often highly enduring if the biggest party could join forces with a micro top-up party or two (argued in detail in the MISTRA Coalitions Barometer II, 2023-2025, online).
‘Ideological / race / liberation history bloc’ criteria: These continuously relevant identity factors will set parameters among the parties that strive to capture the ANC for their alternative power projects. The EFF is likely to play a vital role. The alternative (to the current GNU) power blocs will barter their local level kingmaking power for better standings in future national and provincial governments. Recent coalition history has shown that smaller parties use coalition membership as springboards into improved standings into the next round of elections.
‘The balancing of coalition partners’: The ANC needs local-level non or anti-DA coalitions to counter its national-level alignment with the DA – it softens its GNU alignment with the DA. The balancing helps appease anti-DA groupings in the ANC. (GNU may be eight parties more than just the ANC and DA, but the DA-ANC axis gives the core outright majority.) Furthermore, at the local level in the closing municipal term, the Patriotic Alliance (PA) and EFF have been frequent ANC coalition partners; and Gauteng premier Panyaza Lesufi already favours the EFF, and has advocated that the MKP could be brought in.
‘Speak to anybody who wants to speak to us’ emerges as the ANC bottom-line: Such pragmatism, as articulated by an ANC provincial coordinator, is likely to be the ANC’s general approach. The words quoted were, ‘the ANC is open to talking to all parties who are prepared to work with us’. This could apply to multitudes of small and micro parties that will emerge holding microscopic seat harvests.
The ANC features centrally in coalition scenarios because it is the hitherto dominant party that is being displaced gradually by other parties, or by coalitions in which it still asserts influence. On the eve of LGE 2026 the ANC remains in charge of approximately 105 of South Africa’s 205 local municipalities. Instead of publicly acknowledging the shifting ground that public opinion polls identify, the ANC asserts that it campaigns for outright majorities. On coalitions, its local elections 2026 manifesto states generically that all its coalition partners will have to agree to a written and public coalition agreement, and to coalition arrangements that will ensure that budget processes, professional administration and service delivery are protected from deadlock. Narrow political interests, it says, will not rule over the interests of municipal residents.
The DA has been selectively silent on its preferred coalition partners in the next local round. While it has specifically ruled out the EFF and MKP, the Western Cape’s Alan Winde explained that pre-election talk about coalition partners resembles pre-empting election results. Hence, the reluctance. The party has been mostly evasive when questioned about coalitions with the ANC. Historically the DA has worked locally with the FF+ and IFP… when the numbers added up.
The DA has worked with the ANC where ‘pragmatic local necessity’ dictated it. In one such case, in Kannaland municipality, the two joined forces in the 2016-2021 term to freeze out the Independent Civic Organisation of South Africa (ICOSA). In other councils, the DA has more informally helped pass budgets and crucial votes in cases where the ANC or ANC coalition ran a minority government. This equates with confidence-and-supply arrangements, a specific type of low-key coalition government. This style of coalition is likely to prevail among multiple parties and in a range of municipalities.
The EFF has been clear about its preference for a ‘united left’ government, and vocal in its advocacy of the EFF-ANC-MKP as the dominant alliance of the future. MKP statements converge but also include ActionSA and the PA. Gayton McKenzie (PA) has ventured that he sees the ANC, EFF, MKP, PA and IFP as the next eThekwini government. He also claims there are ‘advanced discussions’ for the formation of a ‘mega-coalition’ comprising the ANC, MKP, EFF, PA and ActionSA.
South Africa’s local coalition practice resembles a colourful matryoshka doll of practical possibilities, existential identity factors, strategic party positioning, and political opportunism and strategy. No doubt, the hitherto revealed considerations will compete with still hidden layers as South Africa moves into the next, heightened round of coalition negotiations and government.