The South African Communist Party (SACP) has submitted candidate lists for the upcoming local government elections due in November, signalling that it will contest the polls directly and independently while maintaining that it remains part of the Tripartite Alliance with the African National Congress (ANC) and Congress of South African Trade Unions (the Tripartite Alliance was formed in 1990, shortly after the unbanning of the SACP and ANC).

In a statement following its Central Committee meeting in Johannesburg over the weekend, the SACP said it would field 4 418 ward candidates across the country. This means that the party will be fielding a candidate in almost every ward in the country, as there are 4 488 wards in total. The party will also contest proportional representation seats nationally.

The November polls mark the first time that the SACP will contest at scale under its own name. It has previously said that it would take this course of action should attempts to restructure the alliance fail to pursue results.

The SACP has stood in a number of elections under its own banner but generally failed to make an impact. It stood in a special election held to elect a new council in Metsimaholo (Sasolburg in the Free State) in 2017, winning nearly 9% of the vote and three of the 42 council seats.

It did not contest any other elections in its own right until 2025. It has stood in ten municipal by-elections in 2025 and 2026, but failed to win any of these, winning more than 10% of the vote only once.

The chart below shows the SACP’s performance in these ten by-elections.

“The SACP has not ‘walked away’ from the [Tripartite] Alliance,” the party said in its statement, maintaining that its electoral strategy was compatible with remaining an alliance partner while pursuing greater political and organisational independence.

It described its aims as an intervention to push left-wing interests: “We aim to address the crisis of working-class representation that emerged without a reconfigured alliance, while the right-wing, conservative and neo-liberal anti-Freedom Charter forces gained priority. The SACP has consistently argued that the alliance must be based on a commonly agreed revolutionary programme, democratic consensus-seeking consultation, collective leadership of the National Democratic Revolution and collective accountability, including collective recall.”

The party rejected suggestions that its decision to contest elections in its own name amounted to a departure from the alliance.

"Our independent electoral contest is not a withdrawal from the alliance," the Central Committee said.

Instead, the SACP said, the decision represented an exercise of its “democratic and organisational independence” and was intended to strengthen working-class political representation while continuing efforts to secure changes to the alliance.

The SACP said it wanted an alliance that allowed itself and other constituent organisations to play a meaningful role in determining policy and strategic direction and in which there was greater collective accountability.

The SACP’s candidate lists included people who were not members of the party, following what it described as an extensive engagement process with communities. Its candidate lists include community development activists and people from faith-based and traditional communities.

Its manifesto is built around the theme “Build People’s Power where we live: for the right to work, water, electricity, roads, land, and safety for all” and identifies six principal municipal priorities. These are: decent work and sustainable livelihoods; reliable public services and maintenance; land, housing and food; safer communities; municipalities free from tender corruption; and greater accountability by councillors to residents.

Unsurprisingly, it said it would campaign against privatisation and outsourcing, while demanding the strengthening of municipal capacity and greater public participation.

It also wants preventative maintenance and faster repairs to municipal infrastructure.

On crime, the party’s manifesto identifies organised criminal networks, extortion, infrastructure crime, and stock theft as major threats to communities. It has called for stronger community safety structures, accountable policing, and better-resourced police stations.

The SACP said its campaign would seek to organise workers and poor communities while building support for a broader left-wing and socialist movement. This is a continuation of efforts that this newspaper has previously reported on.

The Central Committee also linked the election campaign to South Africa’s wider economic difficulties, citing high unemployment, poverty, and inequality as major challenges. The party went on to restate its criticism of Operation Vulindlela and other economic reforms, arguing that these policies were advancing privatisation and weakening public ownership.

It called instead for greater public investment, reindustrialisation, strategic public ownership, and stronger municipal involvement in local economic development.

The SACP also reiterated concerns about crime and corruption within the criminal justice system and called for stronger investigative, intelligence, and prosecutorial capacity.