Alan Winde, Western Cape premier candidate, celebrates the DA’s one million votes in the Western Cape at the Result Operation Centre (ROC) at Century City Conference Centre on 31 May 2024 in Cape Town. (ER Lombard/Gallo Images)

• For the next five years, the DA will again rule the Western Cape.
• With all 1 572 voting districts completed on Saturday evening, it was clear that the DA retained power in the Western Cape with a 55% outright majority.
• Track the latest results via our Elections Map.

With all 1 572 Western Cape voting districts completed on Saturday evening, it is clear that the DA has retained power in the Western Cape with a 55% outright majority.

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However, the Electoral Commission of SA (IEC) has not yet declared the results of the elections.

The DA won a similar percentage of the provincial vote in 2019, with its best showing in the 2014 general elections, where it won nearly 60% of the vote.

The ANC recorded its worst performance ever, winning only 19% of the vote in the province.

The Patriotic Alliance won 7.8% of the vote.

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For the DA, it was all smiles as 1 088 303 Western Cape residents voted for it.

Speaking on behalf of the DA at the IEC Western Cape operations centre, DA councillor Grant Twigg said the party will be continuing with what it started in the province.

Asked about the party’s growth in the province, Twigg said: 

DA provincial leader Tertuis Simmers said Alan Winde would remain premier of the Western Cape, and would soon put together a government. 

Simmers thanked DA supporters and voters for supporting the party.

For the ANC, it was yet another disappointing performance in the Western Cape.

In the 2009 general election it won 31% of the vote, in 2014, 32%, and in 2019, 28.63%.

The 2024 result is the party’s worst result since democracy.

ANC provincial spokesperson Khalid Sayed said its biggest lesson was that an election campaign does not start overnight.

“It starts well before. More than a year before you’ve got to get the nuts and bolts in place and get your message across on the ground. You’ve got to have strong and stable structures on the ground in regions to ensure that you have the machinery to appeal to voters.

“Whilst we feel that we have presented a good message as an alternative government in the Western Cape, there’s still a long way to go,” he said.

The Patriotic Alliance was a big winner in the Western Cape

Despite being a decade old, the PA remained on the margins of South African politics until the 2021 local government elections.

Even then, its support nationally was below 1%.

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Its strongest showing was in the Western Cape in that election, obtaining 2.36% of the vote.

In the previous national and provincial elections in 2019, the PA received only 652 votes in the Western Cape – just 0.03%.

More recently, in Oudtshoorn, the PA won a ward with 1 279 votes (65.4%) and clinched a ward in the Swartland Municipality with 853 votes (40.18%).

It will be the first time that the party is in the Western Cape legislature.

PA provincial secretary Candice Geswind said they plan to be “more action than talk” in the Western Cape.