2016 Local Government Elections
Held on 3 August 2016. Results by municipal area, summed from the IEC's voting-district results. No boundary geometry is held for this election's areas, so its results are shown as tables.
Municipal PR ballot: results
Every voter's proportional representation ballot for their municipal council.
| Party or contestant (as listed) | Votes | Share |
|---|---|---|
| AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS | 8 121 466 | 54,5% |
| DEMOCRATIC ALLIANCE | 4 028 087 | 27,0% |
| ECONOMIC FREEDOM FIGHTERS | 1 228 949 | 8,2% |
| INKATHA FREEDOM PARTY | 636 674 | 4,3% |
| AFRICAN INDEPENDENT CONGRESS | 145 818 | 1,0% |
| VRYHEIDSFRONT PLUS | 113 124 | 0,8% |
| UNITED DEMOCRATIC MOVEMENT | 91 275 | 0,6% |
| CONGRESS OF THE PEOPLE | 67 777 | 0,5% |
| AFRICAN CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATIC PARTY | 62 454 | 0,4% |
| AFRICAN PEOPLE'S CONVENTION | 40 750 | 0,3% |
| PAN AFRICANIST CONGRESS OF AZANIA | 29 799 | 0,2% |
| FORUM 4 SERVICE DELIVERY | 28 849 | 0,2% |
| Others (191 together) | 311 566 | 2,1% |
Show all 203 parties and contestants
Key figures
- Valid votes
- 14 906 588
- Turnout
- 57,7%
- Votes cast
- 15 189 423
- Spoilt votes
- 282 835
- Registered voters
- 26 333 353
- Ballots
- 213
Compare with another local Government election
No map for this election
By province
Provinces as named on polling day
| Province | Valid votes | Turnout | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS | Most votes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eastern Cape | 1 832 048 | 56,2% | 65,9% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 65,9% |
| Free State | 806 281 | 56,0% | 61,9% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 61,9% |
| Gauteng | 3 547 218 | 57,7% | 46,1% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 46,1% |
| KwaZulu-Natal | 3 233 572 | 61,1% | 58,9% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 58,9% |
| Limpopo | 1 261 306 | 50,2% | 69,4% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 69,4% |
| Mpumalanga | 1 055 331 | 55,9% | 71,0% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 71,0% |
| North West | 886 997 | 53,0% | 59,3% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 59,3% |
| Northern Cape | 371 905 | 60,9% | 58,7% | AFRICAN NATIONAL CONGRESS 58,7% |
| Western Cape | 1 911 930 | 63,3% | 26,5% | DEMOCRATIC ALLIANCE 63,6% |
Coverage and comparability
What this election's record holds, the delimitation its areas sit on, and which elections it may be compared with
By ballot
- Municipal PR ballot
- Ward ballot
Boundaries and comparisons
Areas of the 2016 municipal delimitation; no boundary geometry is held, so areas are listed by name and code and never drawn on another delimitation's map.
Nationally and by province this election compares with every other local Government election. By municipality: no other election is on the same delimitation, so municipal results are listed per election and never side by side. Wards are compared only within one delimitation.
About this record
Coverage, limitations, source issues and how the figures were checked
What the record holds
- Loaded: the proportional representation (PR) ballot of every municipality, as sums of the IEC's voting-district rows for each municipality (the number of voting districts summed is stored with each figure).
- Municipal areas are those of this election, as the IEC file lists them. No boundary geometry is held for them: results are shown as tables, never drawn on today's boundaries.
- Ward ballots: 4392 wards of the 2016 delimitation, each the sum of its voting districts in the IEC's results file. Ward candidates are not named in the file; every independent candidate in a ward is in one line, "INDEPENDENT", as published.
What it does not hold
- Not loaded in this milestone: ward ballots (each ward of this delimitation would need its own place record), the district council (DC 40%) ballots (the file does not name the district a municipality belongs to), and district-management-area ballots. Their voting-district rows are in the official file (SHA-256 recorded). Update, 9 October 2026: the ward ballots have since been loaded from the same file (notes below); the district council and district-management-area ballots are still not loaded.
- These are the 2016 wards. Ward codes were reissued at each delimitation, so a 2016 ward is not the 2021 ward with the same number and is not drawn on today's map.
How it was read and checked
- Election date: Polling day as proclaimed in the Government Gazette. The IEC results files do not state the date and the proclamation is not yet among this election's captured documents.
- Reconciled with the IEC's results report (IEC Local Government Election 2016 — Results Summary, All Ballots, all provinces (PDF), results as at 2016/08/11 16:49:53): all 206 figures compared (each party's votes per province and in total; valid, spoilt and cast votes and registered voters) agree exactly.
- Reconciled with the IEC's national results summary: ward-ballot valid votes agree exactly (14 957 083 in the file; votes cast less spoilt in the summary: 14 957 083); independent candidates agree.
Sources
The official files behind these results
| Document | Role | Retrieved | SHA-256 |
|---|---|---|---|
| IEC 2016 Municipal Elections — complete voting-district-level results data (zipped CSV) | Results data | 8 October 2026 | 9ec0c4054e8e2653… |
| IEC Local Government Election 2016 — Results Summary, All Ballots, all provinces (PDF) | Results report | 8 October 2026 | 657128d876e77187… |
Turnout 57,7%