TheCable

South Africa’s governing party, the African National Congress, was comfortably ahead on Thursday with 40 percent of the votes counted from the country’s fifth all-race election — a ballot marked by the participation for the first time of so-called born frees who had no direct experience living under the system of white minority power that prevailed for decades.

The Independent Electoral Commission put the A.N.C.’s share at just over 61 percent, although that proportion was almost certain to change as more results are tallied. The turnout among the country’s 25 million registered voters was said to have surpassed 70 percent.

The party, which presided over the demise of apartheid and has governed continuously since the first all-race election in 1994, secured 65.9 percent in the previous vote, in 2009.

The early figures also showed the Democratic Alliance, the main opposition party in the 400-seat Parliament, significantly increasing its share of the vote. The party, which captured 16.7 percent of the vote in 2009, had collected a 24.5 percent share in early returns. In third place, a radical group called the Economic Freedom Fighters, which casts itself as a champion of the poor, had garnered around four percent.

The Economic Freedom Fighters are led by Julius Malema, who was ousted as head of the A.N.C. Youth League in 2011 and who is bidding to enter Parliament for the first time.

A victory for the A.N.C. was widely forecast, but much still hinges on the final vote count. If President Jacob G. Zuma’s party receives less than 60 percent of the vote, political analysts say, his standing in the party and as president would be diminished. But if, as he has forecast, the A.N.C. builds on its 2009 share to secure a two-thirds majority, the outcome would grant it greater authority to govern and would be presented as a renewal of its mandate as the country’s dominant political group.

Polls before the vote said the most likely outcome was a modest retreat by the ANC of a couple of percentage points.

The election on Wednesday presented two basic narratives. Opponents of the ANC say it has fallen victim to corruption, scandal and ineptitude, unable to deliver services to meet the needs of the ordinary people it claims to represent.

The party insists that during its tenure basic services such as running water and electric power have been provided to millions who were denied them during the long years of apartheid.

Source: New York Times