South Africa government has announced the date for the national and provincial elections. The ballot will hold on May 29, according to a report by President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office on Tuesday.
The elections are presumed to be the most competitive since the end of the apartheid system.
Political analysts have been predicting that the governing African National Congress —ANC— party will lose its parliamentary majority for the first time since 1994, with record power cuts, bad service delivery and increased levels of unemployment among voter complaints.
South Africans will be electing a new National Assembly as well as the provincial legislature in each of the country’s nine provinces before the president is elected by the National Assembly.
Ramaphosa, aged 71, is seeking a second term Presidency. He has strived to lift economic growth impressively since taking over from Jacob Zuma as the president in 2018.
Ramaphosa’s office had been quoted to have said in a statement:
“The 2024 elections tally with South Africa’s celebration of 30 years of freedom and democracy. To this, therefore, President Ramaphosa is calling on all viable voters to fully take part in this important and important milestone of our democratic calendar.”
