PERSPECTIVE: Battle of the stadia as 2019 elections approach day zero By Sy Makaringe
The three biggest South African political parties’ choice of venues for their final rallies this weekend, as well as their themes, tells an interesting story ahead of the much-awaited May 8, 2019 general elections.
This weekend will present all three major parties with the last opportunity to demonstrate to the electorate going into the May 8 polls their strengths by drawing in large crowds to their respective rallies. It will be a show of force. To maximise the opportunity, the ANC dragged a gravely ill, 90-year-old Nelson Mandela out of retirement – dramatically flying him in in a chartered plane from his Eastern Cape home to parade him in front of the cheering crowds, some of which had spilled over into the 37,500-seater Johannesburg Stadium, the nearby overflow venue, where they followed proceedings via TV monitors.
It would appear that the ANC’s fear of a possible less-than-desired turnout at its final election rally made it steer away from choosing the 94,000-seater FNB Stadium on the other side of town as the venue for its final push. Unlike Cope, which remarkably won 37 seats in parliament in its first attempt in 2009 only to lose all of them bar three in the 2014 polls due to mindless leadership squabbles, the newest ANC breakaway party is growing stronger by the day. It’s loud. It’s boisterous. It’s ambitious. It’s radical. It’s everywhere. At the rate it is going, its only way is up.
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