South Africa’s parliament has re-elected Cyril Ramaphosa as president following a landmark coalition agreement between the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and the opposition.
The new government of national unity unites Mr Ramaphosa’s ANC, the centre-right Democratic Alliance (DA) and smaller parties.
Prime Minister Ramaphosa welcomed the new coalition in his victory speech and said voters expected their leaders “to act and work together for the benefit of everyone in our country.”
The agreement was finalized on one of the biggest days of political drama, with parliament sitting late into the evening to vote to confirm who will take power in the new government.
Earlier, the deal followed weeks of speculation about who the ANC would work with, after losing its parliamentary majority for the first time in 30 years in last month’s election.
It won 40% of the vote, with the DA coming in second place with 22%.
ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula said the coalition agreement was a “remarkable step forward”.
That meant Mr Ramaphosa, who replaced Jacob Zuma as president and ANC leader after a bitter power struggle in 2018, could remain in power.
The next step is for Mr Ramaphosa to allocate cabinet positions that include DA members.
The multiparty deal does not include the two ANC breakaway parties, which would probably benefit from failing to deliver the economic improvements demanded by voters.
But opinion polls show many South Africans want this unprecedented grand coalition to succeed.
The ANC has always maintained an approval rating above 50% since the first democratic election in 1994, when Nelson Mandela became president.
But anger over high levels of corruption, unemployment and crime has led to a significant decline in approval ratings for the party.
Speaking to South Africa’s parliament after being confirmed, Ramaphosa recalled his party’s first presidential election victory 30 years ago.
“We have been here before, we were here in 1994 when we tried to unite our country and achieve reconciliation, and we are here now,” he said.
The alliance between the centre-right DA and the ANC is unprecedented as the two parties have been competing for decades.
Under Nelson Mandela, the ANC led a campaign against the racist system of apartheid and won the country’s first democratic elections.
Critics of the DA have accused it of seeking to protect the economic privileges built up by the country’s white minority during apartheid, a charge the party denies.
DA leader John Steenhuisen said this while addressing lawmakers in Cape Town late on Friday. “I think today is a historic day for our country and the beginning of a new chapter.”
The National Assembly was also sworn in as speaker by the ANC, while the vice-speaker position was transferred to the DA.
Among the party leaders speaking after Friday’s agreement was Julius Malema, leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters party he founded after leaving the ANC in 2013.
He said that while his party accepted “the results and the voice of the South African people”, “we do not agree to marriages of convenience to entrench the white monopoly on the economy and means”. Produced in South Africa.”
