Mashatile shrugs off ANC obituaries, predicts victory as he votes in Kelvin

Deputy President Paul Mashatile walked into St Johannes Lutheran Church in Kelvin on Wednesday morning to cast his vote, and walked out with a warning for everyone already burying the ANC: not yet.

For months, opposition parties, analysts and pollsters have framed this election as a reckoning for the governing party.

Service delivery failures, water cuts, unemployment and corruption have fuelled a narrative that the ANC is in terminal decline.

Mashatile, the party's second-in-command, used his moment in front of the cameras to push back hard against that story.

He did not pretend the challenges do not exist but argued that the ANC remains the only party with the national footprint, the structures and the history to govern, and that voters would reward it once again.

"I want to thank all the volunteers on our side who were campaigning. They did very well," Mashatile said.

"So I'm sure that the African National Congress will lead in this election."

It was a confident declaration, delivered without hesitation, in an election where the ANC is defending its hold on metros it has already lost or been forced to share through coalitions.

In Johannesburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni, the party has spent the past five years watching power slip through its fingers. In Nelson Mandela Bay, eThekwini and other councils, its majorities have thinned to the point of irrelevance.

Mashatile's answer to that reality was not to dwell on losses, but to reframe the election as a test of delivery rather than a referendum on the past.

"What is important from now on is that the councillors who are going to come in must now address the challenges that our people are facing," he said.

And yet turnout, once again, threatened to undermine the legitimacy of the exercise. Early indications on Wednesday pointed to long queues in some areas and empty voting stations in others, particularly in Gauteng's urban centres where apathy runs deepest.

Mashatile acknowledged the uneven picture but urged South Africans not to surrender their power by staying at home.

"It's good to see many people going out in many parts of the country," he said.

He called on those who had not yet voted to go out and support the party of their choice, insisting that the process itself remained safe and free.

"It's good for our democracy. This is what we fought for," he said.

"It's a democracy. It's free. There's no intimidation. There's no violence. Please come out," Mashatile said.