Election’24: Brilliant insights from SA’s pollster extraordinaire Gareth v Onselen

South Africa’s political pollsters surpassed all expectations with their accurate calling of Election’24 – the watershed vote which was a shock for many and a surprise for most. In this fascinating review of the campaign, Victory Research CEO Gareth van Onselen takes us through the data, sharing his inside track on how and why polls fluctuated and what they mean for SA’s big and small parties and political leaders going ahead. He spoke to BizNews editor Alec Hogg.

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Highlights from the interview

In this interview between Alec Hogg and Gareth van Onselen, they delve into a detailed analysis of South Africa’s recent elections, focusing on party performance, leadership favorability, and the dynamics that shaped voter sentiment. Van Onselen provides insights into various political parties’ strategies, their leaders’ favorability ratings, and how these factors influenced election outcomes.

The discussion begins with an examination of smaller parties’ performance, such as the DA, PA, and Rise Msanzi, highlighting their struggles to gain significant traction despite certain initial expectations. Van Onselen points out specific trends in party support and how these correlated with campaign strategies and external influences, like the DA’s efforts to contain threats from smaller parties in the Western Cape.

They then pivot to leadership favorability, dissecting the ratings of prominent figures like Cyril Ramaphosa, Julius Malema, and Mmusi Maimane. Van Onselen notes shifts in favorability compared to past elections, indicating changes in public perception and party dynamics. Notably, he remarks on Ramaphosa’s diminished ability to boost ANC support solely through his personal brand, signalling a shift in political landscape dynamics.

The conversation concludes with reflections on the potential impact of newly elected members entering Parliament, hinting at possible shifts in political discourse and agendas. Overall, the interview provides a nuanced understanding of South Africa’s political landscape, highlighting the intricate interplay between party strategies, leader favorability, and voter behaviour that shaped the recent election outcomes.

Edited transcript from the interview ___STEADY_PAYWALL___

00:00:03:11 – 00:00:26:17

Alec Hogg: Well, the South African election has come and gone, and one of the great successes of this election is how accurate the polls were. Now, there were many people who felt that this wasn’t going to be the case. We’ve seen polls all around the world coming horribly wrong. And yet in South Africa, where there was a massive change, these polls were deadly accurate.

00:00:26:18 – 00:00:39:06

Alec Hogg: We’re going to be talking to Gareth van Onselen. He’s the chief executive of Victory Research. Appropriately named.

00:00:39:08 – 00:01:06:00

Alec Hogg: Gareth, you’ve had an interesting career. It appears as though after you—well, once you finished your academic side, at Wits, you were drawn into politics. So I suppose it’s not surprising to see you as a pollster. But why did you join the Democratic Alliance in 2001? And why not, having spent nearly ten years there, go to Parliament, as I guess most people who’ve gone through that channel would?

00:01:06:02 – 00:01:34:14

Gareth van Onselen: Thanks. Yeah, well, you know, I’m a liberal animal by heart and certainly, you know, politics is hardwired into my DNA. And so there was a natural overlap with getting into the political universe, and the DA ideologically made sense to me. And, you know, the research inside politics is—if you’re into that kind of stuff, it doesn’t get better than being in the heart of the beast.

00:01:34:19 – 00:01:53:00

Gareth van Onselen: And I like a bit of a fight. It’s good to have something you believe in and argue for. But I didn’t ever really want to be a public face. You know, I had no real interest in talking to constituents or standing up in Parliament. I mean, it’s the research I really like, and I could do that at the DA.

00:01:53:00 – 00:01:55:10

Gareth van Onselen: So yeah, that worked well for me.

00:01:55:14 – 00:02:06:13

Alec Hogg: And then after that, into journalism, that was an interesting part of your career. And you didn’t—you didn’t stick with journalism forever. Some of us do. Why was that?

00:02:06:15 – 00:02:42:16

Gareth van Onselen: No, I then went and worked as a senior reporter for the Sunday Times. In fact, I did the poll—the Sunday Times ran a poll in 2009 or 2014 on the election. And, you know, stayed there for around two years or so, but I found it a bit constricting in terms of what you can say in the space that you need to be able to say it. You know, at the end of the day, I kind of moved on to the head of politics, where there’s much more freedom to write as long and as detailed and as personal kind of stuff as you want. And then after that, I went to Victory Research.

00:02:48:00 – 00:03:13:01

Alec Hogg: Being the flagship of the think tanks here in South Africa has been nearly 100 years old. Extraordinary to think that it took on the apartheid government, took on government before that. And now it’s being cast as a right-wing operation, whereas I guess they’re just telling truth—speaking truth to power. That must have been great fun working also with Frans. Great, yeah.

00:03:13:18 – 00:03:35:17

Gareth van Onselen: Yeah, it was great. I mean, also a wonderful place to work. You get given a lot of blue sky to kind of do what you think’s the right kind of thing, and there’s a lot of trust and, you know, very good organizational infrastructure, which results in not just you being able to produce high-quality stuff and have the resources and expertise. I mean, I’ve got a brilliant internal research system and some great people working there, but the right way to advertise the stuff and put it out there so that it looks professional and reaches the right audience. You know, great place to be.

00:03:49:17 – 00:03:55:10

Alec Hogg: So, Gareth, Victory Research. Is that your company, or was it part of a bigger group?

00:03:55:12 – 00:04:27:01

Gareth van Onselen: No, Victory Research has actually been around for ages. I think it started in 2012. I only joined in around 2020. Yeah, and it was kind of a very small company before I joined and did a lot of bespoke market research. In fact, it did the US election research in 2019. But, you know, we took a look at it and thought, this thing has the potential to get really big, not actually in South Africa, but internationally. And so I joined, and we’ve kind of tried to position it as more of a mainstream company now. And it’s doing well, so it seems to have been the right call.

00:04:37:14 – 00:05:02:15

Alec Hogg: Well, certainly the results that you managed from your most recent work in the South African election must surely have been ringing bells all around the world, where many of the research companies have really just not got it right. Let’s have a look at that, though, and you can take us through—thank you for sending this lovely graph.

00:05:02:17 – 00:05:22:14

Alec Hogg: It’s an interactive graph which I’m going to put on screen now. And we can then see how it tracks. Maybe you can talk us through where it started. And as the graph runs, it’s only 35 seconds. How things changed.

00:05:22:19 – 00:05:42:06

Gareth van Onselen: Yeah. So this is a 58% model. And, you know, one of the things you have to do during the election is try to guess what the right turnout is. So we ran five, and we were lucky enough to get it pretty close on the 58 one. I mean, I think final ten of the 58.6. So this model is the most applicable.

00:05:42:07 – 00:06:01:10

Gareth van Onselen: And, yeah, there are a few things that are interesting about it. One, the ANC, as you’ll see now, sort of climbed steadily for the first 4 or 5 weeks of the track and then declines towards the end. And I think that was—you can see it’s reaching its peak at around 46 now. And now it starts to decline.

00:06:01:12 – 00:06:21:09

Gareth van Onselen: And that was the weekend when the Zuma decision in Nkandla was made. And I think that really hurt the ANC towards the end of the election. I mean, the other interesting thing is you can see MK tracks above the EFF almost the entire election cycle. There are a few points where they just touch, and it obviously climbed a bit at the end.

00:06:21:09 – 00:06:41:12

Gareth van Onselen: And I mean, we didn’t run the track in the last 48 hours before the election, so it was kind of 48 hours where stuff could move. They obviously ended very strong. The EFF went down a bit. But I mean, all in all, it was, you know, spot on. I think it got exactly the right trends, the strength of MK, the decline in the ANC down towards 40.

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00:06:41:13 – 00:06:47:04

Gareth van Onselen: And you know, the battle for sort of third or fourth place between the EFF and MK.

00:06:47:06 – 00:07:14:11

Alec Hogg: And that decline by the DA. And just for those of you who haven’t read the legends at the bottom, the green is the ANC, the blue is the DA, the orange is MK, the red is the EFF, and the yellow is IFP. But just having a look at that decline by the DA towards the end, it’s pretty sharp from 23 to 21%.

00:07:14:11 – 00:07:20:19

Alec Hogg: In the context of the overall graph, did they make some blunders in the campaigning?

00:07:20:21 – 00:07:47:11

Gareth van Onselen: No, I don’t think so. I mean, well, you can have an argument about the DA’s long-term strategy and whether it’s the best thing for it to eventually emerge as a kind of 30% plus party. But in the short term, I don’t think it made any strategic errors. I think what happens and typically in elections, going back as far as you can, is the DA manages to secure a fair amount of black support outside of an election.

00:07:47:13 – 00:08:11:16

Gareth van Onselen: I mean, typically it ends an election with around 4 or 5%, but prior to an election, you can get that all the way up to 7 or 8. And what happens as the election unfolds is the ANC essentially squeezes the more marginal black voters off the DA. And it does that by playing the race card, by saying things like social grants will be taken away or you’ll go back to apartheid.

00:08:11:16 – 00:08:36:15

Gareth van Onselen: And it really hurts the DA and those black voters who are partial to the DA but susceptible to that kind of racial messaging tend to be squeezed off the party. They don’t go to the ANC or MK, they sort of opt out, but it hurts the DA’s support the closer the election gets. The other way, the other important fact is, you know, that the line is actually pretty straight.

00:08:36:17 – 00:08:55:18

Gareth van Onselen: I mean, yes, there’s a bulge towards the end where it goes up and declines, but really, you could draw a straight line through that kind of average DA track. And yeah, it’s done better than it has in the past. It’s hurt more than this in the past. And maybe that’s a positive sign for the party going forward.

00:08:55:20 – 00:09:21:18

Alec Hogg: So interesting because if you have a look at the DA’s real background and real history and Helen Zille, I worked with her many years ago when she was a political correspondent at the Rand Daily Mail. And she was a force of nature, taking on the apartheid government. She comes from a family deep in anti-apartheid tradition, and she took a lot of risks back then.

00:09:21:18 – 00:09:46:02

Alec Hogg: But suddenly she’s been painted as this. Well, somebody who voted with the what was it, 31% who wanted to keep apartheid in 1992, and 68% of every white South African said no. So it’s strange that the DA hasn’t managed to somehow show that the narrative that the ANC is putting forward is just so wrong.

00:09:46:04 – 00:10:04:14

Gareth van Onselen: Well, I mean, this, you know, it’s not just a problem for Helen Zille. And that stuff is a problem for the whole party, which is labeled as this kind of right-wing, whites-only party. I mean, one of the things we did in the track, which we haven’t made public yet, but we probably will in the next week or so, is, you know, we track the demographic profile of each party.

00:10:04:14 – 00:10:32:16

Gareth van Onselen: So, you know, who by age, gender, race, income, educational level supports each of these parties. And, you know, at the end of the day, 24% of the DA’s support comes from black South Africans. I mean, in terms of its baseline support, that’s around 850,000 black South African voters, which is basically more or equal to every other opposition party, including the IFP outside of an election.

00:10:32:18 – 00:10:55:17

Gareth van Onselen: And, you know, it’s symptomatic of a lot of the public attitude out there towards more scientific analysis of what is actually happening in the real world. You know, ideology and prejudice and personal animus between politicians drive these kind of fantasy narratives. And they just don’t hold up when you look at the raw data.

00:10:55:19 – 00:11:16:21

Alec Hogg: So that’s our job in the media, is to make pretty sure that we can get the facts out there and get the real truth. And that’s why it’s great to be talking to you today because you’ve always relied on that, and it’s given you, I think, an advantage when you come and comment on politics. You know, I come from the business world, and in the business world, it’s all based on fact.

00:11:16:21 – 00:11:27:03

Alec Hogg: You can’t give narratives, and then you produce the income statement that shows that you were lying because you can’t keep your job. But it seems in politics, that’s not an obstacle.

00:11:27:05 – 00:11:49:08

Gareth van Onselen: When I would say inside the business world, that’s true. Certainly when it comes to the business world’s external evaluation of the political landscape, that is not… I mean, huge amounts of gut feel analysis and what I think and you are like and I heard this at a Brian. Yeah. I mean, it’s and that’s not particular to the business world.

00:11:49:08 – 00:12:17:09

Gareth van Onselen: That’s a fundamental problem across the board. But, you know, we really are… I would go so far as to say hostile towards kind of data-driven analysis. It’s not just a case of being ignorant about it. I mean, I think there are a lot of people that are openly hostile to the idea that you can reasonably measure what’s actually happening out there because it often contradicts their kind of, you know, personal goals or targets or animus or prejudice.

00:12:17:11 – 00:12:39:12

Alec Hogg: Unfortunately, we do not report on what people in the business community think about politics because it’s trying way outside the circle of competence. But when we look at what happens with their financial results, and that’s an area they can’t give us a narrative on. But Gareth, you’ve put together a really lovely slideshow for us, and I want to go through each of those slides.

00:12:39:12 – 00:13:06:00

Alec Hogg: It marked, we might go into some detail, I guess, on some of them, but let’s kick off with the Social Research Foundation. We know that your former colleague at the IRR, Frans Cronje, is a huge fan of yours, and I presume that there was some relationship or he knew your work and you knew what he was wanting to do with the Social Research Foundation that drew the two of you together.

00:13:06:00 – 00:13:16:20

Alec Hogg: But, my goodness, you have really shaken up the whole approach, I think, in many ways, to polling in South Africa. How did this come together?

00:13:16:22 – 00:13:42:19

Gareth van Onselen: Well, let me first say something about Frans. He said some very nice things about me on business. And I mean not just to return the compliment, but because I believe it’s true. Market research is a standard feature of most elections in kind of developed democracies. I mean, it’s fairly new to South Africa, and we have quite a consistent, conspiracy-driven public zeitgeist with a lot of mistrust.

00:13:42:21 – 00:14:03:21

Gareth van Onselen: And it’s really brave with the SRF that it costs a lot, and it takes a lot to run a track like this, and not only in the interests of public debate and informed decision-making and data-driven analysis did Franz undertake the project, but he made it all public, and I really think that speaks well of him.

00:14:03:23 – 00:14:27:10

Gareth van Onselen: It’s a genuine, helpful, insightful contribution to public debate. And I think, you know, because a lot of the polling was pretty close to what was happening out there, it’s done a lot to legitimize polling in South Africa, and I think that can only be a good thing. And Franz should take credit for that just with regards to our relationship.

00:14:27:10 – 00:14:51:14

Gareth van Onselen: Yeah. I mean, you know, I worked with Frans at the IRR before I joined. I had done 2019 polling. So he knew what we could do and what they were capable of. We haven’t done one publicly. but you know, Franz knew what we could do and invested quite a lot of faith in us.

00:14:54:02 – 00:15:24:16

Alec Hogg: Well, indeed. And it was, as you say, as you said earlier, it really has been an eye-opener for many people in South Africa that polls were so close to it. You had a debate with Herman Mashaba from Action SA, and maybe you can explain this to us because he was convinced that he was going to get multiple of the final polling that will count.

00:15:24:16 – 00:15:44:17
Alec Hogg: That Action is like Action. It’s a got in the election. But you, pretty adamant that that wasn’t the case and pointed out in a hard-hitting article on business that we published, that his criticism of pollsters was completely off the mark. Just explain the science here.

00:15:44:18 – 00:16:08:10
Gareth van Onselen: Yeah. So, I mean, one of the things that SRF didn’t do was publish the findings for smaller parties. And the reason it does that, I mean, the huge green blur you see on the screen is the margin of error, and it’s obviously I mean, it stays the same for big or small parties, 2.5%. But if you’re only on 1%, then 2.5% counts for a lot.

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00:16:08:12 – 00:16:26:12
Gareth van Onselen: As opposed to if you, the ANC or the DA. So, you know, the room for error appears more for smaller parties, but it’s actually the same. And it can be a bit misleading for the public. So we didn’t put the stuff out there. But I mean, one of the great things about this poll was how accurate we were on the smaller parties as well.

00:16:26:12 – 00:16:48:15
Gareth van Onselen: And this is actually South Africa’s graph. You can see the thick green line in the middle is its base support, which kind of never moves from around 1.7, sort of 1.5 fairly straight. And the lighter lines are at different turnout models. But at the end of the day, I mean, the big picture is this party was an or zero around 2% for the whole election.

00:16:48:17 – 00:17:09:16
Gareth van Onselen: It clearly got squeezed in the last couple of days and ended up at 1.1. And the point is not to obsess about whether this, you know, graph was within 0.5 of South Africa. The point is the general trend this is clearly a party operating in a small band of support. It’s not going to break out of it, and it’s going to finish somewhere around there.

00:17:09:18 – 00:17:12:00
Gareth van Onselen: And that’s what happened.

00:17:12:02 – 00:17:36:17
Alec Hogg: So Herman’s got a lot of work to do in the next five years as he’s going to continue to invest in it. Similarly, with a PA, they were expecting a far better turnout, in particular in the Western Cape. And yet they were very happy at the end of the day, to get those nine parliamentarians just before the election, I spoke to Gayton McKenzie, who was confident of 25.

00:17:36:19 – 00:17:50:08
Alec Hogg: So I suppose if you’re a politician, you’ve got to be looking at the top end of that, of the big broad, graph that you’ve got there. And I suppose best possible scenario for them would have been, well, almost 4%.

00:17:50:10 – 00:18:08:12
Gareth van Onselen: Yes. And there was a moment in the election, if you look at the middle of that graph, you can see the PA sort of climbs all the way up to around 2.6%. And that was on the back of a substantive amount of growth in the Western Cape, which is the PA’s primary support base.

00:18:08:13 – 00:18:28:18
Gareth van Onselen: And, you know, the reason why they declined from there is basically the DA. I mean, the DA poured a huge amount of money and resources into squeezing the PA down. It was a fundamental threat to the party in the Western Cape, and it managed to contain it. There was a moment where I think the DA was really panicked.

00:18:28:19 – 00:18:38:04
Gareth van Onselen: But I mean, that’s the difference. And you would see that reflected on the Western Cape graph, this kind of growth in the middle and then a decline towards the end as, as the PA is squeezed.

00:18:38:06 – 00:18:57:23
Alec Hogg: I suppose it’s you can’t be surprised that the Democratic Alliance got panicked because, as you say in the middle of that graph from late April to early May, the PA was on a on a bit of a tear, a 1.4% to 2.6%. And had that trend continued, Gareth. Wow. Who knows what might have happened?

00:18:58:01 – 00:19:18:06
Gareth van Onselen: Yes. I mean, it’s certainly had the potential to get up to 3 or 3.5%, I think, and if it hadn’t been for that kind of squeeze-back message from the DA, I think it would have been quite possible. I mean, these smaller parties are intricately tied to the reputation of their leader. And you’ll see just now we’ll look at leader favorability.

00:19:18:08 – 00:19:36:03
Gareth van Onselen: But when Gayton McKenzie’s leadership, personal favorability goes up, the PA vote goes up. And that’s the same with a lot of these smaller parties. So it’s not just a matter of containing the PA, it’s a matter of responding to the brand of the leader, which I think the DA also did quite well.

00:20:58:06 – 00:21:18:16
Alec Hogg: And the Freedom Front. Plus, interestingly enough, it shows an upward trend towards the election where I know within the party they were concerned that maybe the campaign of late reboot South Africa wasn’t one that was that was actually resonating with the voting public.

Gareth van Onselen: Well, I think and this is another reason why I think the DA hurts in the final, final couple of days is the Freedom Front’s. You know, it really had a great last ten days on the track with it and sort of systematically moved up. It was having a really bad election up to that point, especially compared to where it was in 2019, and whatever it changed or did in those last.

00:21:39:19 – 00:21:57:04
Gareth van Onselen: And, you know, things like, you know, I could have helped it as well because it’s another party with a very clear, unambiguous message on in air. would have helped. but yeah, I mean, that those final ten days, I think, really saved the party’s kind of 2024 election results.

Alec Hogg: Rossum Zenzi the media’s favourite or in certain parts of the media, the pharaoh. Tim Cone, my friend that, Daily Maverick, gave him his vote. Didn’t help him, think that much, but I guess, you know, you got to vote your conscience. What do you make of that? Before we talk about that, what do you make of media, giving endorsements to political parties?

00:22:22:18 – 00:22:46:06
Gareth van Onselen: Oh, I don’t mind that at all. I mean, you can have an argument about whether you agree or disagree with the endorsement, but, I don’t mind that at all. I could maybe make an exception for editorials, but, you know, at the end of the day, I’m kind of, I think it’s important, you know, this idea that newspapers are totally objective, impartial things.

00:22:46:06 – 00:23:10:11
Gareth van Onselen: It’s not true. Newspapers have a certain outlook onto the world. And as long as you’re clear about what that outlook is with the public, so you don’t pretend you’re something you’re not, then it’s perfectly reasonable to make, you know, give an endorsement or have a political view. I mean, all the big newspapers the world over do that, and all of them have a certain ideological outlook, and they’re pretty upfront about it.

00:23:10:13 – 00:23:25:05
Gareth van Onselen: The problem in South Africa is there’s this pretense that newspapers are all entirely objective and impartial and that, you know, they should aim for that in the news reporting. But when it comes to the editorial pages, in my opinion, there’s no reason to be that as long as you’re clear about who you are.

00:23:25:06 – 00:23:47:22
Alec Hogg: I still believe my vote is my secret. So I’m not telling anybody. But, good luck to those who do it. Just looking at Rise Msanzi, was it ever going to be, I suppose there in mid-May? It looked like it was. It was heading for, well, a pretty good election, but with two members of Parliament maybe be below a long way below what they anticipated.

00:23:48:00 – 00:24:12:16
Gareth van Onselen: You know, the interesting thing about Rising Sun is how similar it is to both. I mean, it’s almost the same kind of graph, almost the same kind of trends, a sort of very tight group of about 0.5% of the electorate who are very on board, rhizomes and Z. There’s no fundamental difference in those last 3 or 4 weeks to its low turnout scenarios and its base support.

00:24:12:18 – 00:24:32:06
Gareth van Onselen: And, you know, I made the case on Twitter that I think about 2 or 3 months ago that these two parties should have got together. I think they complement each other quite well. and that would have made an exponential difference. I think sort of 3 or 4% would have been on the table then. But you know, either those things work out or they don’t internally.

00:24:32:06 – 00:24:41:12
Gareth van Onselen: And and, you know, the downside was that I think they split the same market between the two of them. And, and each managed sort of 0.5 of a percent.

00:24:41:14 – 00:25:00:15
Alec Hogg: Just the graph you were mentioning, national leadership Favourability cycles through all unfortunately at the bottom. But yeah, the numbers are the names are a little bit confused. but maybe you can just I suppose you have to see the top one is surreal. And then the know and would be blue and so on.

00:25:00:17 – 00:25:39:03
Gareth van Onselen: Yes. Alex, you’ve savaged my beautiful graph but can still make sense. yeah. So at the top is, is Ramaphosa. And he had a fairly stable election as far as his personal favourability goes, sort of always at around 41% or so. The thing that’s interesting about his favourability is in 2019, you know, the phenomenon of rum of fury, as it was called, was driven by the fact that his favourability was bigger than the party’s favourability, and his brand was able to carry the ANC over 50%, or at least contributed significantly to that.

00:25:39:05 – 00:26:03:06
Gareth van Onselen: The difference in this election between his personal favourability in the ANC is almost zero. and indeed between the ANC support base, I mean, he ended up on 41 favourability in the ANC on 40. So he’s lost the ability. His brand has lost the ability to be able to elevate party support. It’s now pretty much pegged to the ANC and there’s no core differentiator anymore.

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00:26:03:08 – 00:26:35:12
Gareth van Onselen: which, you know, internally will probably hurt him. I know there are a whole lot of other considerations that play to whether he stays on or not, but he certainly lost that sort of magical touch he had in 2019. if we look at some of the other numbers, I mean, third and second and third place, Zuma and Malema fighting it out, they switched positions a few times, but basically they’re both worth around sort of have 25% favourability, which is remarkable for someone like Zuma.

00:26:35:14 – 00:26:55:10
Gareth van Onselen: but, you know, explains how it is eNCA was able to do so well, seeing as him and and Mkhize synonymous that the interesting ones, are a bit further down. I mean, so the blue line is, is Stan Hayes and then the black line is my money. They two kind of exchange positions for fourth and fifth place.

00:26:55:12 – 00:27:17:23
Gareth van Onselen: The interesting thing about Stan Hayes, and is that his favourability is lower than the DA’s. And as far as I can recall, that is the first time that the DA has ever run an election campaign with a party leader’s. Favourability is lower than the party’s, and some of that can be explained by time. This is his first national election, and you need to build up a public profile.

00:27:17:23 – 00:27:44:15
Gareth van Onselen: And it takes a while. but some of it is I just don’t think he has the kind of impact that that someone like my money has. and so for the DA, the party had to carry the leader, which is, is is the first time my money. I mean, that speaks to his potential. You know, that that Favourability is the remnants of his time as a DA leader where hundreds of millions with poured into his brand.

00:27:44:15 – 00:28:13:17
Gareth van Onselen: It’s much lower than it was when he was the DA leader, sort of ten points down. But given his favourability is 18% the biggest in South Africa, to end up with 0.5 is something’s gone wrong. There. and maybe it’s the lack of an actual party structure around him from then, you know, things get McKinsey you can see is is got a fairly solid reputation at around 4 or 5%, IFP leader is, you know, fairly small.

00:28:13:17 – 00:28:28:15
Gareth van Onselen: And right at the bottom is some guess or ZB who I mean, his primary problem in this election was 78% of voters had never heard of him. So, you know, you can’t you can’t run a campaign with such a small leadership favourability. And and I think that hurt him.

00:28:28:17 – 00:28:59:14
Alec Hogg: Well, maybe he’s going to change all of that when he does get into Parliament and does his, because he’s in Parliament now. And we look forward to hearing from some guys, from Mmusi, from Gayton McKenzie. It could be a very interesting, new

00:28:59:16 – 00:29:07:17
Alec Hogg: Well, maybe he’s going to change all of that when he does get into Parliament and does his, because he’s in Parliament now. And we look forward to hearing from some guys, from Mmusi, from Gayton McKenzie. It could be a very interesting, new parliament that’s coming forward. But Gareth, one Vaughan uncertain, the CEO of Victory Research, thank you for taking us through this fascinating insight into how the polls were calling it and eventually how South Africans voted in the most important election.

00:29:07:19 – 00:29:13:19
Alec Hogg: Unquestionably since 1994. Gareth van Onselen is the chief executive of Victory Research. I’m Alec Hogg from BizNews.com.