Coalition confusion: Voters need education on alliance phenomenon, expert says

Voters need education to clear confusion about coalitions, which have become a common feature of the South African political system, now and in the future.

This was a message from Terry Tselane, executive chair of the Institute for Election Management Services in Africa, who added that coalitions are not the people’s will, but arrangements among political parties after elections.

Tselane, formerly of the Electoral Commission of SA, was a keynote speaker and panellist at the launch of the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (Mistra) Coalitions Barometer 2026 in Johannesburg yesterday.

Coalition governments become more common

The yearly barometer found that between the 2021 local government elections and February 2026, the cut-off of its data-driven research, 80 of the 213 municipalities had “hung” councils at some point.

This means no single party held the majority of seats in the council.

This situation represented just over a third of all the elected councils in the country.

But 23 administrations had survived coalition changes and remained in office in their original form four years after the 2021 election.

During the period under review, the 80 municipalities produced 175 separate governments.

Hung councils produce changing administrations

It’s not only municipalities affected by hung arrangements as this phenomenon had emerged in the legislatures of Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and Northern Cape.

The number increased from the 70 hung councils that emerged from the 2021 local election and by February, 74 councils were run by a coalition or minority government.

The report, presented by Mistra researchers Laurence Caromba and research associate Ayanda Ndletyana, indicated that a change of administration does not necessarily mean that the largest party lost power.

In the 101 changes in coalitions up to February this year, in 38, the largest party rebuilt its coalition with different partners, while in five, it won an outright majority and could govern alone.

“Coalitions are not the will of the people, they are an arrangement of the parties. There is a lot of confusion around this.

“Public education is needed on this issue to avoid misunderstanding among the electorate because a coalition is a compromise among parties, not the electorate’s wishes or what the voters voted for.”

South Africa’s model compared with Germany

Tselane criticised the South African coalition approach where partner parties pull in different directions, with no coherence around a particular programme.

He said coalitions in South Africa were characterised by divergent or opposing views on issues such as foreign policy and economic transformation.

This contrasts with the German coalition system, where partners agree on a programme and modus operandi before forming the coalition.