The party is setting up a task team, led by Minister Parks Tau, a former Johannesburg mayor, to tackle service delivery issues. (Dwayne Senior/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
TThe ANC has set up a special task team to address local government service delivery issues which it says contributed to the municipality's poor performance in the May 29 national and provincial elections.
The team will be led by Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition Parks Thau, who previously served as Deputy Minister of Cooperative Governance and Mayor of Johannesburg (2011-16).
These issues are causing instability in metropolitan areas, ANC interim spokesman Zuko Godlimpi told reporters on the sidelines of the party's national executive committee (NEC) meeting in Ekurhuleni on Monday.
“South Africans are no longer interested in distinguishing between different spheres of government. They have a moral claim that the state and the government are one and that problems should be addressed by all,” he said.
“That is why the president [Cyril Ramaphosa] “Yesterday, the ANC said it was going to get very serious about local government, starting with Johannesburg.”
The meeting came after the party's approval rating fell below 50 percent in elections this year for the first time since 1994. Having lost its majority in parliament, the ANC formed a national unity government.
Godolimpi said NEC members would be deployed to local governments struggling with insecurity, adding: “In some cases NEC members will be deployed, in other cases regional or state leaders will be deployed. There is no one-size-fits-all approach.”
The ANC faced its steepest decline in support in metropolitan areas such as Johannesburg, Tshwane and Nelson Mandela Bay, which have suffered from long periods of instability in governance.
Godolimpi said the party was discussing concrete plans to turn around its electoral results ahead of the 2026 local government elections and would return to the accountability framework agreed last year, which called for secretary-general Fikile Mbalula to carry out ongoing performance reviews of all NEC members.
“We need to be in a position to say what the assignments are for the first four weeks, what the assignments are for the next eight weeks, and what the assessments will be. [are] Then we can provide those reports in real time, including understanding what the constraints are,” Godolimpi said.
“If progress is slow, we can't wait a year or two to be told, 'We can't deliver water there because these are the problems we're facing.' We need to get that understanding in the short term and encourage supportive measures from higher levels of government.”
It is no longer “business as usual” for the party. “What has changed is that the ANC has been defeated. [support]Having lost its majority, it cannot afford to lose steam. The ANC knew it had a problem but it could easily have become complacent about how it dealt with it. The ANC can no longer be complacent.
“The urgency of the situation stems from the objective reality that the ANC is losing the elections, so we have no choice but to act quickly and make things better.”
Godlimpie said the party would focus on the city of Johannesburg, where “the political situation has become untenable” and “something has to change”.
The capital region has become a political battleground, with parties calling for Mayor Kabelo Gwamanda to step down after the ANC and ActionSA reached an agreement with the Economic Freedom Fighters after a breakdown in relations. The city has seen around five mayors since the 2021 local elections.
Godlimpie said poor service delivery could deepen inequalities, lead to social unrest and discourage significant numbers of people from voting.
“If we don't make it work, it puts at risk the capacity of the entire democratic order. It's the voters who should be voting. Some aren't even registered, some are registered but don't turn up to the polls. Their numbers are bigger than any of the political parties in the system,” he said.