- South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has reached a coalition agreement with his party and nine other parties to form a new cabinet.
- The African National Congress retained most of the ministerial posts, with ANC figures holding 20 of the 32 ministerial posts.
- Six ministers were appointed from the Democratic Alliance, with ministers also appointed from smaller coalition parties.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa named a new cabinet late on Sunday after the former main opposition African National Congress and nine other parties agreed to form a coalition government after weeks of negotiations.
Ramaphosa’s party retained the lion’s share of cabinet posts, appointing ANC allies to 20 of the 32 ministers in the new coalition government, but the Democratic Alliance, once the main opposition and the ANC’s fiercest critic, got six ministers, and Ramaphosa distributed the remaining posts among several smaller parties.
Ramaphosa’s announcement of the new multiparty government came a month after the ANC, which had ruled Africa’s most industrialized country for three decades, lost power in national elections and was forced to find a coalition partner. The party’s share of the vote in the May 29 vote fell to 40 percent, losing its parliamentary majority for the first time since coming to power in 1994, the year the white-minority apartheid system ended.
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The DA came in second with 21% of the vote.
President Cyril Ramaphosa waves ahead of the presidential inauguration at the Union Buildings in Tshwane, South Africa, on June 19, 2024. Ramaphosa named his new Cabinet late on Sunday night after the former main opposition party, the African National Congress, and nine other parties agreed on the makeup of a coalition government after weeks of negotiations. (Kim Ladbrook/Pool Photo via The Associated Press)
Some have joined what the ANC calls a government of national unity, which would allow them to join any of the 18 parties represented in parliament. Others have refused to join.
A power-sharing coalition is unprecedented for South Africa. The country briefly had a coalition government at the end of apartheid, but that was a different situation: The ANC had a clear majority after the country’s first all-race elections, but new President Nelson Mandela invited other members into government as an act of reconciliation.
This time, the ANC needed the cooperation of lawmakers from the DA and other parties to re-elect President Ramaphosa to a second term.
South Africans quit the ANC in a landmark election driven by frustration over poverty, some of the world’s highest rates of inequality and unemployment, and President Ramaphosa said on Sunday these issues would be priorities for his coalition government.
There are 11 parties in the coalition, but the ANC and the DA, the long-time ruling party and main opposition party, are the two largest parties and play key roles. Talks between the two have been tense and protracted, with the DA reportedly on the brink of walking away from the power-sharing arrangement until Friday’s meeting between President Ramaphosa and DA leader John Steenhausen.
“We have shown that no problem is too difficult or intractable to be resolved through dialogue,” President Ramaphosa said, noting that the negotiations had been complex.
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In his most significant cabinet decision, Ramaphosa reappointed the ANC’s Paul Mashatile as deputy president and appointed the ANC’s Parks Thau as minister of trade and industry – a key post sought by the DA and a central point of tension between the two parties.
DA leader Steenhuisen was appointed minister of agriculture, and President Ramaphosa also welcomed the leaders of four other parties into cabinet as new ministers.
“We had to ensure that all political parties could participate meaningfully in the national executive,” Ramaphosa said.
