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New polling* from The Common Sense and the Social Research Foundation shows the share of Democratic Alliance (DA) voters with an unfavourable view of John Steenhuisen, the party's leader until April and its Minister of Agriculture until June, when he was moved to Deputy Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition, has risen at each of the four readings since February last year, from 10% to 17%, 19% and 24%. The favourable share has held between 42% and 51%, standing at 48%, 51%, 44% and 42% across the same rounds. Steenhuisen remains far better liked than disliked by DA voters, 42% to 24% in July, but the gap between the two has narrowed from 38 points to 18. The chart below shows the share of DA voters with a favourable and an unfavourable view of Steenhuisen at each of the four rounds in which he was asked about.

* The figures come from four Social Research Foundation Market Surveys conducted in conjunction with The Common Sense and carried out by Victory Research using telephonic CATI interviews. A single frame random digit dialling design was used in each round, with respondents screened for voter registration and then interviewed, and the sample was further quota-controlled for key demographic characteristics of South Africa's registered voter population. National SIM card penetration exceeds 250.0%, making telephonic interviewing a reliable method of reaching a representative sample of registered voters. Each sample was fully weighted according to the demographic parameters of the registered voter population. Figures in this piece are for DA voters, a subgroup of each round's registered-voter sample. Each round carries a national margin of error of 4.0% at a 95.0% confidence level; the margin for a subgroup is wider.

The rounds were: 4 to 19 February 2025, 1 004 respondents, design effect 2.0127; 27 October to 15 November 2025, 1 002 respondents, design effect 1.7620; 20 February to 6 March 2026, 2 222 respondents, design effect 3.2675; and 8 to 31 July 2026, 2 214 respondents, design effect 3.7938.