Cyril Ramaphosa has been returned for a second term as President of South Africa.
In an unsurprising result in the election of the newly-constituted National Assembly late on Friday night, Ramaphosa beat out Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader, Julius Malema for the country’s top job.
The contest gave a glimpse of what the seventh administration is likely to look like, a partnership of the African National Congress (ANC), Democratic Alliance (DA), Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) and Patriotic Alliance (PA).
On Friday morning, the Progressive Caucus – comprised of the EFF, United Democratic Movement (UDM), United Africans Transformation (UAT), Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC), African Transformation Movement (ATM) and Al Jama-Ah – was aggrieved, saying its members had been sidelined in talks of a Government of National Unity (GNU). It expressed little interest in contesting the position of State President – rather focusing its attention on those of Speaker and Deputy Speaker in whatever talks it hoped would take place with the ANC.
However, during the course of the day, things changed.
Despite all indications that the election of the State President would go the way of that of the two presiding officers – where the Progressive Caucus was soundly beaten by, what for all accounts, appeared to be an ANC, DA, IFP and PA voting bloc- it forged ahead to ensure that the election of number one would not be a walk over.
Breaking News | Cyril Ramaphosa elected SA President:
The results came as no surprise – Ramaphosa received 283 votes as opposed to Malema’s 44 votes.
In his acceptance speech President-Elect Ramaphosa said the following, “I wish to state very clearly this is not a grand coalition of two or three parties. It is a government of national unity that we are constituting, and we’ve been here before. We were here in 1994 when we sought to unite our country and effect reconciliation. We are here now, as directed by the votes that our people delivered, to work together to ensure that we address the challenges that they face. And this we shall do, and this is what I am committed to achieving as the president of the Republic of South Africa.”
President-Elect Cyril Ramaphosa will be inaugurated this coming Wednesday at the Union Buildings in Pretoria, in a ceremony to be presided over by Chief Justice Raymond Zondo.
