‘I just need change’: voters voice discontent as South Africa goes to polls

Polls have consistently shown the ANC on less than half of the national vote, down from 57.5% in the last national ballot in 2019. Photograph: Kim Ludbrook/EPA

In the heart of Soweto, at the president’s home voting station, support for the African National Congress (ANC) was everywhere as South Africa went to the polls, with many voters wearing the party’s bright yellow and speaking of their families’ generational loyalty to the movement that fought to end apartheid.

However, even here, there were voters who had turned against the ANC, as it risked losing its majority in national elections on Wednesday for the first time since Nelson Mandela led it to power in South Africa’s first fully democratic vote in 1994.