The ANC has taken a hard knock in electoral polling over the last week, dropping from an average of 44%-45% in recent months to 32% support in recent days, from the party’s traditional supporters, according to the Social Research Foundation (SRF).
The SRF which conducts monthly telephone interviews with about 1,000 recipients, says ANC voters seem particularly “fed up and disillusioned” after the government’s failure last week to present a budget speech.
“When we assign a voter to a party, we ask direct and indirect questions. The battery of answers over time allows us to provide the necessary experience to assign voters to parties with confidence. The unusual thing we have now seen is that one third of the ANC’s [remaining voters] can no longer pass the threshold test to be ANC voters.
“They seem to have got fed up and disillusioned. They are saying the ANC has promised reform seven times in the last five years and they no longer see themselves voting for the party,” chair of the SRF Frans Cronjé said in an interview with Business Day on Monday.
The ANC’s loss of majority in the May 2024 general election has heightened the stakes as the party tries to win back confidence in the electorate.
Cronjé said there was “great hope” for the government of national unity (GNU), which the ANC was forced into after the election result, but polling now suggests that “hope is now dwindling”.
“If you go some months back you see sharp improvement for the ANC after the GNU announcement and then that reversing into the present as the GNU disappoints,” Cronjé added.
The GNU, a coalition of 10 political parties, still faces the daunting task of balancing fiscal pressures against the urgent need to improve living conditions among ordinary South Africans.
Meanwhile, a special cabinet meeting is scheduled for Monday, when members of the executive will discuss the postponement of the budget to March 12 over the disputed proposal to hike VAT by two percentage points.
It is the first in a series of scheduled meetings among leaders of GNU parties aimed at resolving the impasse that led to the unprecedented budget postponement last week.
Draft documents of the 2025/26 Budget Review show the Treasury was preparing to increase VAT to 17% from 15% to fund a big increase in spending on front-line services.
This was rejected by GNU leaders, setting the stage for a political showdown in the coalition government.
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