Umm Muhammed Umar

Radio Islam spoke to News24’s Qaanita Hunter, at the ROC, in Pretoria, on Tuesday morning. The point of enigma, everywhere, appeared to be the reason behind the IEC taking seemingly forever to tally the votes. Hunter was outraged that at 8.45am, the 60 percent mark had just been passed, when the IEC had projected that the vote count would be at 90 percent by Monday night. She said, “[If] We look at KZN that’s the sluggishness there. You look at Northwest, there’s still no indication of municipalities like Rustenburg, etc.”

Hunter said that she was very interested in eThekwini – there was a projection made by a News24 forecaster, that eThekwini would be a hung municipality, and that the ANC would be unable to retain the majority there. This possibility was very significant, and opened the question of whether the ANC would consider joining a coalition.

She said that she found it interesting that in areas where service delivery was terrible, the ANC had failed, and it’s majority now has declined. In areas like Limpopo and Mpumalanga, where the party still had the majority of votes, their votes have, nevertheless, decreased drastically. Interestingly, the DA vote has also decreased on those areas. She said that all the votes the DA had gained in 2016, were now no longer existent, but that the DA was still celebrating that they had won one municipality, the Umgeni municipality.

Regarding the EFF, and the coverage that they receive, the controversy that they generate, the level of the ‘big talk’ that comes from the national leaders, Hunter said that the EFF entered the elections presuming that they would take the role of king maker. Hunter said, “The reality of it is that the other smaller, obscure, parties are going to be more of kingmakers than what the EFF is going to be.” She said that while they have won in areas where it was to be expected, if you look at wards, on Monday they had won only four wards. She said, “yes, they’re benefitting from PR votes, but not so much from wards, because people are not entrusting them to run their particular wards. They were the third largest party, and had done well in 2016, when they were the ‘new kids on the block’. She added that what was really happening was that the EFF was dropping by a seat in many municipalities, instead of at least maintaining the seats they already had, which is what would be expected of the ‘new kid on the block’. The EFF was not an effective opposition. Hunter said the EFF had really believed that in KZN the ANC would be dominant, and then that they would be very close to that.

Hunter added that she was waiting for the numbers to come in for Rustenburg, as the EFF had really put up a big show there, and that she was wondering how much of a presence they would be having in the coalition talks, and if they would be in a position to make the demands that they previously had made. She speculated about whether the EFF would, “sort of take it on the chin, and stay in opposition to enjoy the seats that they do have and work to increase the support next time.”

Hunter said that coalition talks were fragile, ego based, and not based on principles. She said that coalitions would love for the public to believe that they were based on ideologies, when they were not. She added that coalitions were very localized, so what parties may have agreed on in one area, did not necessarily apply to another area. Significantly, Hunter expected that smaller parties would be able to make bigger demands now.