By Lesedi Sibiya-Diplomatic Insider 

The Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (MISTRA) held a webinar in tandem with the Nelson Mandela School of Public Governance at University of Cape Town as well as the Kingdom of the Netherlands in order to discuss this era of coalition governance in South Africa. 

For majority of South Africa’s 32 years of democracy, the country has been run by single party dominance but since the unprecedented national elections of 2024, which saw ANC for the first time since coming into power, losing the faith of the nation which has opened up the pathways to a coalition government known as the Government of National Unity (GNU) which is comprised of ten political parties.

 South Africa is no stranger to coalition governance, specifically from a municipal scale and considering that the 2026 local government elections are due to take place, it is more pertinent than ever for South Africa to take a look at the effectiveness of coalition governance. 

The GNU has seen its fair share of instability specifically noted in the 2025 national budget, which saw Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana give a record three budget speeches in the same year due to misalignment within the GNU.

 The expropriation act also came as a major point of misalignment for the GNU as it highlighted divisions over redistribution and property rights. The Basic Education laws amendment act caused heightened tensions over how schools are being run as well as navigating language policies which caused division in political views rather than unifying learners.

 One of the speakers at the webinar was Professor Bert Koenders who serves as Professor of Peace, Justice and Security at Leiden University’s Institute of Security and Global Affairs, as he shared his insights on how the Netherlands have navigated coalition governance, as his country has had coalitions over the course of 100 years. 

“I would like to say with a lot of humility as well in my country at the moment, that coalition politics is in crisis although we’ve done it for 100 years, we’ve had four governments in the last 8 years.” said Professor Koenders in his panel discussion.

 “The Netherlands has always been a country of minorities. Historically we’ve had in our building of coalitions after the second world war, when the country was destroyed, there was a system of social democrats, Christian parties, and a smaller liberal party used to follow the rules of coalition governments” Koenders continued.

 Koenders went on to add that at the time of this resurgence, the Netherlands were led by very elitist standards, stating that those governments had seen a group of elite people making deals with one another in order to protect their interests and the interests of the party they represent.

 The panel discussions highlighted South Africa’s continued distrust with their parliamentary institutions.