South Africa's Government of National Unity Under Stress: MK's Rise and the Road to 2029: Deluair Consultancy

On May 29, 2024, the African National Congress recorded 40.18 percent of the National Assembly vote, its first sub majority result since 1994, returning 159 of 400 seats. The Democratic Alliance held second place at 21.81 percent (87 seats), the Umkhonto we Sizwe Party led by former President Jacob Zuma took 14.58 percent (58 seats) on its first ballot, the Economic Freedom Fighters fell to 9.52 percent (39 seats), and the Inkatha Freedom Party returned 17 seats. On June 14, 2024, ten parties signed the Statement of Intent constituting the Government of National Unity, and on June 30 President Ramaphosa announced a 32 minister cabinet in which the DA accepted six portfolios including Home Affairs, Public Works and Infrastructure, Agriculture, and Basic Education, while the ANC retained Finance under Enoch Godongwana, Defence, Trade and Industry, and Mineral and Petroleum Resources. The arrangement produced an immediate equity rerating, with the FTSE/JSE All Share Index closing 2024 up 9.4 percent in rand. Stress points have since concentrated on the Basic Education Laws Amendment Act, the National Health Insurance Act, and the Expropriation Act, each of which the DA has either litigated or refused to implement in DA controlled portfolios. This brief assesses what the GNU has delivered, where it has fractured, how MK has reshaped the opposition, and how sovereign creditors, multinationals, and asset managers should price the road to 2029.

The May 2024 result and the architecture of the GNU #

The Independent Electoral Commission certified the May 29, 2024, National Assembly result on June 2, 2024. The African National Congress fell from 57.50 percent in 2019 to 40.18 percent in 2024, a 17.32 point swing that is the largest single cycle decline of any governing party in the post 1994 Republic. The Democratic Alliance moved from 20.77 to 21.81 percent, a marginal gain that masks internal redistribution toward the Western Cape and metropolitan Gauteng. The novelty was the entry of the Umkhonto we Sizwe Party, registered with the IEC in September 2023 and built around former President Jacob Zuma after his July 2024 expulsion from the ANC. MK contested its first national ballot and took 14.58 percent, displacing the Economic Freedom Fighters as the third largest party. EFF support fell from 10.79 percent in 2019 to 9.52 percent, and the Inkatha Freedom Party held its KwaZulu Natal heartland with 3.85 percent.

The June 14, 2024, Statement of Intent constituting the GNU was signed by ten parties: the ANC, the DA, the IFP, the Patriotic Alliance, the Pan Africanist Congress, the United Democratic Movement, GOOD, the Freedom Front Plus, Rise Mzansi, and Al Jama-ah. Combined National Assembly seats totalled 287 of 400, above the 201 seat majority threshold and the 267 seat two thirds constitutional threshold. On June 30, 2024, the cabinet was announced. The DA secured six of 32 minister posts: Home Affairs (Leon Schreiber), Public Works (Dean Macpherson), Agriculture (John Steenhuisen), Basic Education (Siviwe Gwarube), Communications (Solly Malatsi), and Environment (Dion George). The ANC retained Finance (Enoch Godongwana), Defence (Angie Motshekga), International Relations (Ronald Lamola), Mineral and Petroleum Resources (Gwede Mantashe), and Trade and Industry (Parks Tau). Deputy President Paul Mashatile assumed the role conventionally held by the ANC heir apparent.

Party	Vote share, 2024	Vote share, 2019	NA seats, 2024	GNU member
African National Congress	40.18	57.50	159	Yes
Democratic Alliance	21.81	20.77	87	Yes
uMkhonto we Sizwe	14.58	n.a.	58	No
Economic Freedom Fighters	9.52	10.79	39	No
Inkatha Freedom Party	3.85	3.38	17	Yes
Patriotic Alliance	2.06	0.08	9	Yes
Vryheidsfront Plus	1.36	2.38	6	No
ActionSA	1.20	n.a.	6	No

National Assembly result, May 29, 2024. Source: Independent Electoral Commission, certified result, June 2, 2024.

The MK insurgency and the geography of the realignment #

Umkhonto we Sizwe is a single province phenomenon overlaid on a national protest vote. In KwaZulu Natal, MK took 45.35 percent of the provincial ballot and 37 of 80 provincial legislature seats, displacing the ANC as the largest party in the province for the first time since 1994. The IFP returned 18.07 percent, the ANC fell to 16.95 percent from 54.22 percent in 2019, and the DA held 13.16 percent. The provincial executive was formed by an IFP led coalition with the DA and the National Freedom Party, leaving MK in opposition at the provincial level even as it dominated the vote share. That MK governs no province despite winning a provincial plurality is the central organisational fact of the next cycle.

Outside KwaZulu Natal, MK polled 9.04 percent in Mpumalanga, 5.04 percent in Gauteng, and below 3 percent elsewhere. The EFF lost ground to MK across former strongholds in Limpopo and the North West, indicating the protest vote against ANC incumbency has bifurcated along ethnic and regional lines rather than consolidating around a single insurgent vehicle. Gauteng produced the most fragmented provincial outcome: ANC 34.76 percent, DA 27.40 percent, EFF 12.05 percent, MK 9.84 percent. The Gauteng Provincial Government is now run by an ANC, DA, IFP, Patriotic Alliance, and Rise Mzansi minority coalition mirroring the national GNU. The Western Cape remains a DA majority government at 53.97 percent, the only province in which a single party retains an outright legislative majority.

Where the GNU has held and where it has cracked #

The GNU has held on the items that bond markets watch most closely. The 2025 Budget delivered on March 12, 2025, after a rare postponement of the February 19 tabling, passed the National Assembly with all ten GNU partners on a revised package that withdrew the proposed two point VAT increase to 17 percent. The VAT retreat was the first significant DA win inside cabinet. The SARB Monetary Policy Committee cut the repo rate by 25 basis points at each of its November 2024, January 2025, and March 2025 meetings to 7.50 percent, with headline CPI at 3.2 percent year on year in January 2025. The FTSE/JSE All Share Index closed 2024 up 9.4 percent in rand and 14.4 percent in dollar terms, and net foreign portfolio inflows turned positive in the second half of 2024 after sustained outflows since 2018.

The cracks have concentrated on three statutes. The Basic Education Laws Amendment Act, signed September 13, 2024, gives provincial education heads final say over admissions and language policy. The DA, AfriForum, and Solidarity filed Pretoria High Court papers contesting clauses 4 and 5, and Minister Gwarube announced in October 2024 that those clauses would not be implemented for an initial three year period. The National Health Insurance Act, signed May 15, 2024, creates a single payer Fund replacing private medical schemes for covered services and is opposed by the DA, SAMA, HASA, and Business Unity South Africa, with multiple constitutional challenges filed. The Expropriation Act, signed January 23, 2025, repealed the 1975 Act and codified expropriation without compensation in narrowly defined cases. The DA launched a constitutional challenge in February 2025, and the United States issued an executive order on February 7, 2025, suspending bilateral assistance and offering refugee status to Afrikaners. AGOA eligibility for the 2025 review remained under explicit threat through Q1 2026.

Macro stress tests, fiscal arithmetic, and the rand #

Stats SA reported real GDP growth of 0.6 percent in 2024, undershooting Treasury's 1.1 percent February 2024 estimate. Mining and agriculture contracted, manufacturing was flat, and only finance, real estate, and personal services posted positive contributions. Official unemployment stood at 31.9 percent in Q4 2024 and the expanded definition reached 41.9 percent, with the 15 to 24 youth band at 60.7 percent. Eskom recorded zero days of load shedding from March 26, 2024, through to a brief return of stage three cuts in the second half, and the coal fleet Energy Availability Factor rose to 62.9 percent, the highest annual reading since 2018. The 2025 MTBPS targets a primary surplus of 0.9 percent of GDP in 2025-26 rising to 1.7 percent by 2027-28, with gross debt stabilising at 76.2 percent of GDP in 2025-26 before declining.

Sovereign ratings remain a constraint. S&P upgraded the outlook to positive in November 2024 while affirming BB-, Moody's affirmed Ba2 stable, and Fitch held BB- stable in May 2024. The South Africa five year CDS traded at roughly 174 basis points at year end 2024 against 245 basis points at the start of the year. The risk for 2026 is twofold. First, the loss of AGOA preferences would remove duty free United States access for 1,800 product lines covering automotive exports of roughly 2.7 billion dollars per year, citrus exports of roughly 200 million dollars, and a long tail of agricultural and light manufacturing exports. Second, fragmentation of the GNU on a single high salience legislative vote, most plausibly a National Health Insurance implementing regulation or an Expropriation Act amendment, would crystallise the latent rand premium built up since June 2024.

Indicator	2023	2024	2025e	Source
Real GDP growth, percent	0.7	0.6	1.5	Stats SA, Treasury MTBPS Oct 2025
Headline CPI, end period, percent	5.1	3.0	4.0	Stats SA
SARB repo rate, end period, percent	8.25	7.75	7.25	South African Reserve Bank
Unemployment, official, percent	32.1	31.9	n.a.	Stats SA QLFS Q4
Gross loan debt, percent of GDP	73.9	75.5	76.2	National Treasury MTBPS
Primary balance, percent of GDP	-0.7	0.4	0.9	National Treasury MTBPS
JSE All Share, percent change in rand	9.3	9.4	n.a.	JSE
Rand per dollar, end period	18.5	18.9	n.a.	South African Reserve Bank

Macro and fiscal scoreboard. Sources: Statistics South Africa, National Treasury Medium Term Budget Policy Statement October 2025, South African Reserve Bank, Johannesburg Stock Exchange.

Succession arithmetic inside the African National Congress #

President Ramaphosa is constitutionally barred from a third term and his current term ends in 2029. The next ANC elective conference is scheduled for December 2027 and will choose the party president who would lead the ANC list into the 2029 ballot. Deputy President Paul Mashatile, elected at the December 2022 Nasrec conference, is the conventional heir apparent. His candidacy faces three open questions: unresolved Public Protector inquiries from his Gauteng tenure, residual loyalty inside ANC structures to Zuma era figures who have since migrated to MK, and the open contest with the Ramaphosa loyalist current that includes Justice Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi and Ronald Lamola.

MK's internal architecture is more centralised and more fragile. Zuma serves as party president and his daughter Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla holds a senior parliamentary role. The foundational legal vulnerability is that Zuma was personally barred from sitting as an MP under section 47(1)(e) of the Constitution following the Constitutional Court's May 20, 2024, ruling on his prior contempt conviction. Zuma therefore leads MK from outside the National Assembly. The succession question is whether the party can transition past Zuma to his daughter, his nephew Mzwanele Manyi, or a KwaZulu Natal figure who can hold both the Zulu nationalist base and the protest vote outside the province. Coalition arithmetic for 2029 falls into three scenarios: an ANC plus DA plus IFP renewal in which the GNU becomes a pre electoral pact, an ANC plus MK plus EFF reverse coalition in which the ANC abandons the DA for a left nationalist bloc, and a fragmented hung parliament in which provincial coalitions dictate the national executive. Sovereign credit pricing should distinguish between the first two scenarios with at least 100 basis points of spread.

Implications for sovereign creditors, multinationals, and asset managers #

Sovereign creditors should treat the GNU as a positive but conditional rerating. The coalition is the binding constraint on whether the consolidation path is credible. Investors holding 2030 and 2035 dollar denominated sovereigns should price three discrete events through mid 2027: the 2026 Local Government Election, the first nationwide test of MK's reach beyond KwaZulu Natal; the December 2027 ANC elective conference, which determines the 2029 presidential candidate; and any NHI implementing regulation or Expropriation Act test case decision that triggers a DA coalition exit.

Multinationals in agriculture, mining, and pharmaceuticals face asymmetric exposure. Agricultural exporters to the United States should run a base case of Q3 2026 AGOA suspension and a stress case of permanent suspension, sizing duty bearing access against redirected volumes to the European Union and Gulf. Pharmaceutical and medical scheme operators should assume sequenced NHI implementation with sustained constitutional litigation through 2027. Mining operators should treat MPRDA amendments and critical minerals localisation as the most likely vehicle for ANC backbench leverage if the GNU fragments.

Asset managers should treat the rand as a cleaner expression of coalition risk than the JSE, since the equity index is dominated by hard currency earners and gold producers whose dollar revenue dampens local shocks. The ten year government bond yield closed 2024 at 9.04 percent against 11.36 percent at end 2023, with the term premium compressed by roughly 230 basis points. A DA coalition exit event would plausibly reverse 100 to 150 basis points of that compression in a five day window. The highest probability portfolio expression is a long rand bond, short rand spot pair conditional on confirmed GNU renewal through the December 2027 ANC conference, with the inverse on a confirmed DA coalition exit or any successful NHI constitutional challenge that compels cabinet rebalancing.

Sources #

Cite this brief

@misc{hossen2026southafricagnu2026,
  author = {Hossen, Md Deluair},
  title  = {South Africa's Government of National Unity Under Stress: MK's Rise and the Road to 2029},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://deluair.com/consultancy/insights/south-africa-gnu-2026},
  note   = {Deluair Consultancy briefs}
}

Hossen, M. D. (2026). South Africa's Government of National Unity Under Stress: MK's Rise and the Road to 2029. Deluair Consultancy briefs. https://deluair.com/consultancy/insights/south-africa-gnu-2026

Hossen, Md Deluair. "South Africa's Government of National Unity Under Stress: MK's Rise and the Road to 2029." Deluair Consultancy briefs, 2026-04-26. https://deluair.com/consultancy/insights/south-africa-gnu-2026.

south-africa anc da mk ramaphosa zuma gnu 2029-election

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South Africa's Government of National Unity Under Stress: MK's Rise and the Road to 2029