The ANC won 62% of the vote in the 2011 local elections, 54% in 2016, and 45% in 2021. In last week's local elections, its share fell to the low 30s. By contrast, the DA's vote share has remained between 21% and 27% throughout that period.

In this clip from Talking Sense, Frans Cronje explains where the ANC's voters have gone, primarily to the MKP, the EFF, and ActionSA, rather than the DA. He argues that this makes an ANC-DA coalition more workable, as the two parties are not competing for the same voters. Gabriel Makin points out that, for the first time, the ANC, MKP, and EFF together have fallen below 50% of the vote.