The ruling African National Congress party is in the lead with over 60 percent of the votes counted. 

The ANC, however, is currently falling short of a majority, which is required to win the election.

The Democratic Alliance sits second while former President Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) party currently third.

If the ANC does not receive more than 50 percent, it will need to make a deal with other parties to form a coalition government.

Meanwhile, official results are not expected to be announced before Sunday.

With results from about 64% of polling stations in, MK was in third place on Friday with 11.8% of votes. The ANC had 41.9%, down from 57.5% in the last 2019 election, looking set to lose its majority for the first time in 30 years.

Oscar van Heerden, a researcher and author of books on the ANC, has said if it were not for former President Zuma’s party, the MK, the ANC might have retained its majority nationally.

“A lot of people that are disaffected in South Africa … want to see a much more radical policy orientation than what the ANC could provide,” van Heerden told Reuters.

Separately, Siphamandla Zondi, a politics professor from the University of Johannesburg, told AFP, “The MK has really eaten into the ANC’s vote.”

According to a voter satisfaction survey by the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), a social science and humanities research institution, 63 percent of the people who cast their ballot in the election did so because they believe their vote makes a difference.

Ninety-two percent said the elections were unequivocally fair.

The report quoted by local media said voters queued longer this year compared with the polls in 2021 and 2019.

Eleven percent of the participants said they queued longer than an hour.

Sixty-three percent expressed that they were happy with their experience at voting stations.

Sanusha Naidu, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Global Dialogue, a South African think tank, who spoke to Al Jazeera from the election results headquarters in Johannesburg, said, “For me right now, I think the biggest message I am taking out from what I’m seeing on the [results] board is …

“…the metros haven’t come in in certain of the big provinces. We haven’t seen the metro in Durban come in, and that is the second largest registered number of voters in the province. Gauteng, the largest number of registered voters in the country – those metros have not come in,” she said.

“So I think some of the political parties like the ANC at this point are really, really hoping that [results from the metropolitan areas] will sway it a little beyond the 42 percent and then move it closer to that 45 percent, which gives them a little bit of wiggle room in terms of what kind of [coalition] discussions they can have.”

As of the time of filing this report, more than 63 percent of the votes have been announced.

The Election Commission has seven days from the date of the elections to announce results.

Ahead of the polls, the IEC said it will announce final results on Sunday, June 2.

Photo Credit: Emilio Morenatti/AP Photo

Source of Election Results: Al Jazeera