South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) has expressed “confidence” that it would “overwhelmingly” win next week’s national elections, ANC head of elections Fikile Mbalula has said.
With only five days left to polling day, Mbalula said that through its campaign the ANC has been able to gain back the trust of voters to enable it earn success in all the country’s nine provinces.
“Ours has been a campaign of winning the trust of the people, and the Thuma Mina (Send Me) campaign – which is about fixing people’s issues – has worked very hard to win the trust of the people,” Mbalula said.
However, Mbalula – who characterised the election campaigning as having been “difficult” – said the ANC was confident that it would win the heavily contested Gauteng Province and even the Western Cape — which the ANC has not governed for the past 10 years.
“The people have taken the ANC to task during door-to-door campaigns. They have made it clear that their vote is not a blank cheque. We have to earn it. We admitted that we veered away from our goals and we are committed to fixing that,” Mbalula said.
Mbalula recalled how South African voters had punished the ANC in the 2016 local government, losing four major cities, and the party had learnt its lessons from its mistakes, he said.
“The people showed us flames in the last election. They said we are arrogant, we don’t listen, we are corrupt, only served ourselves.
“We had to demonstrate to our people to win their trust that we are committed to undoing the things they did not like. We went to their houses day and night, asking for the votes,” Mbalula said.
NM/jn/APA