PA Takes Seat Off DA in WC, IFP Defends One in KZN

Two by-elections were held yesterday, with the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) defending a seat in Umzumbe on the KwaZulu-Natal South Coast, and the Patriotic Alliance (PA) taking a seat off the Democratic Alliance (DA) in George in the Western Cape.

In Umzumbe the by-election had become necessary because the sitting IFP councillor, Siyabonga Doncabe, had defected to the uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP), although he was not selected as MKP’s candidate in the by-election.

The IFP saw a slight decline in its vote share, as compared to the 2021 local government election (LGE), dropping from 50.1% to 43.2%, but this was still enough for it to hold the ward.

The African National Congress (ANC) was second with 32.2% of the vote. MKP will be relatively disappointed with its performance, winning only 16% of the vote, with the National Freedom Party managing 8.2%.

In George the PA took a seat off the DA. Yesterday’s by-election was the second to be held in the ward since the 2021 LGE. In July 2023 the DA had won the ward off GOOD. Another by-election became necessary in the ward because the DA candidate, Theresa Jeyi, defected to the PA, who did not choose her as their candidate for the by-election.

In yesterday’s by-election the PA saw its vote share jump from the 22.4% it recorded in the 2023 by-election, to 65.3% while the DA dropped from 46.0% in 2023 to 34.3%.

In terms of raw numbers the DA remained fairly flat, winning 983 votes yesterday, compared to 996 in 2023. However, the PA saw its number of votes leap from 474 to 1 873. It is likely that the PA candidate was backed by supporters of a number of parties which chose to not contest this by-election, such as GOOD, and a local party, the Plasslike Besorgde Inwoners.

This is now the PA’s fifth by-election in George since the 2021 LGE where it has taken a seat off another party in the municipality (it has also successfully defended a seat in a by-election).

After the 2021 LGE the PA held one of George’s 55 seats, it now holds six.

Overall, the IFP and ANC will both be fairly happy, having seen off the challenge of MKP yesterday. It is too early to say with any certainty but recent by-elections have seen MKP perform fairly poorly, and the party may be hard pressed to do as well in the next LGE as it did in the 2024 national election, when it almost won a majority in KwaZulu-Natal.

Meanwhile, the PA continues its march across the rural Western Cape, but the DA’s vote held up well in yesterday’s by-election, and it’s too early for the DA to start panicking.