Africa-Press – South-Africa. The new leader of South Africa’s second-biggest political party expects the stability of the nation’s coalition government to be put to the test when its larger rival holds internal elections next year.
The vote within the African National Congress “is a moment of profound risk,” Geordin Hill-Lewis, who was elected leader of the Democratic Alliance at the weekend, said in an interview with Bloomberg TV on Monday.
“The fights will be incredibly bitter and we will have to reassess what it means for the coalition government and for the country thereafter,” he said. Play Video
The DA joined the co-called government of national unity in 2024, after the ANC lost its parliamentary majority for the first time since apartheid ended three decades earlier, taking up three seats in President Cyril Ramaphosa’s cabinet.
While the formation of the business-friendly administration has cheered investors, internal relations have been fraught, with its two main members sparring over policy and appointments.
Ramaphosa is expected to step down as party leader in 2027 and of the country in 2029. His deputy, Paul Mashatile, and ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula are considered among the frontrunners to succeed him.
“We sincerely hope that there emerges a leadership that is able to see the bigger picture of what is right for South Africa,” said Hill-Lewis, 39, who is also the mayor of Cape Town — a post he intends to retain.
He sees it as highly unlikely that the DA will be able to negotiate more cabinet posts during the current administration’s tenure.
The DA won 22% support in the country’s last national vote and aims to become the biggest party in 2029. That will require a significant increase in its backing among a predominantly Black electorate that has largely shunned a party that has previously had a largely White leadership.
The first key test for Hill-Lewis will come in municipal elections that are expected to take place later this year and will gauge whether the DA is managing to capitalize on public anger over a collapse of water provision and other basic services in ANC-run municipalities.
One key battleground will be Johannesburg, the nation’s economic hub, where former DA leader Helen Zille is running for mayor.
“The old, very stuck racial silos of our politics are starting to break down,” Hill-Lewis said. “A growing majority of South Africans are just sick and tired of seeing every every basic service, every state function, every state department eroded and dilapidated through corruption and mismanagement. And so the tide really is turning.”
For More News And Analysis About South-Africa Follow Africa-Press
