ANC weighs up partners from free-marketeers to Marxists

The African National Congress was holding high-stakes internal talks yesterday about which parties it should approach to form South Africa's next government, with diametrically opposed Marxists and free-marketeers on the menu of options.

After 30 years of dominance since Nelson Mandela led it to power in the 1994 elections that marked the end of apartheid, the ANC lost its majority in last week's national vote. It remains the largest party but can no longer govern alone.

Voters punished the former liberation movement for high levels of poverty, joblessness and inequality, rampant crime, rolling power cuts and corruption - problems that have held South Africa back and will challenge the next government.

It will have 159 seats out of 400 in the new National Assembly, while the free-marketeer Democratic Alliance (DA) will have 87. The populist uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK) will have 58 seats, the Marxist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) 39, the socially conservative Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) 17 and the far-right Patriotic Alliance (PA) nine.

"The ANC is still trying to make up its mind about what it wants to do," said Charles Cilliers, co-founder and head of strategy for the PA, which calls for the mass deportation of undocumented immigrants and the return of the death penalty.

"Everyone is reliant on the ANC coming to a decision. There's a lot of pressure on them from big money, from big business in South Africa, to work with the DA," he told Reuters.