LGE 2026 Manifestos: Party conduct and general pledges, and what sits within a council’s powers

What we did: we took the manifesto data for the twelve parties as at 22 October 2026 and counted every promise that the comparison page places under “Party conduct and general pledges”, by the verdict on each. Sources are listed at the end.

Party names. ACDP is the African Christian Democratic Party. AMM is the Afrika Mayibuye Movement. ANC is the African National Congress. DA is the Democratic Alliance. EFF is the Economic Freedom Fighters. FF Plus is the Freedom Front Plus. IFP is the Inkatha Freedom Party. SACP is the South African Communist Party. UDM is the United Democratic Movement. ActionSA and GOOD are the full names of those two parties. BOSA is written here as the party writes it in its manifesto.

We also keep Integrity Watch, a public register of documents that were corrected, withdrawn, refunded or punished after someone found made-up material in them.

This folio is about a different kind of check. It asks which of the party conduct and general pledges in election manifestos sit within a council’s powers, and which do not.

The 2026 local elections in short #

The vote. South Africans vote in local government elections on 4 November 2026. They choose the councillors who run 257 municipalities: 8 metropolitan (big-city), 44 district and 205 local. The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) certified 136,790 candidates for 10,526 council seats. On 15 October 2026 the Constitutional Court directed the IEC to take the steps needed to put 181 ANC candidates on the ballot in six municipalities, so the final count will change. On 16 October 2026 the IEC said 32 other parties in the same position would get the same relief.

How many parties. 732 political parties are registered with the IEC at various levels. The IEC says 546 of them nominated candidates for this election.

What a council does. South Africa has three spheres of government: national, provincial and local. Part B of Schedules 4 and 5 of the Constitution list the matters a municipality may administer: 38 in all. Among them are drinking water and domestic waste-water and sewage systems, electricity and gas reticulation (the local networks), refuse removal, municipal roads and street trading. Jobs, schools, hospitals, welfare, the courts and immigration are not on those lists. A council can still lobby, partner with or press the government that holds the power.

What a manifesto is. A manifesto is a party’s published list of promises, so that voters can read them and decide.

What Ukweli did. Ukweli has analysed twelve party manifestos for this election. It found 2,419 promises and quoted each in the party’s own words, with its page. It checked each promise it could assess against the Constitution’s lists of what a council does. Where a sentence is too short or vague to test, or Ukweli’s checks did not settle it, the card says “Could not be assessed by Ukweli”. Where a sentence promises several things that fall under different powers or spheres of government, the card says “Mixes different powers”. Both labels describe Ukweli’s check, not the party.

Who is in. The twelve parties are shown below. Ukweli analyses any 2026 local government manifesto it can obtain from the party’s own publication. That is a rule about documents, never a judgement about a party. Parties have reported 19 manifesto launches; for the other seven, Ukweli cannot reach a readable document online. Many other parties contest the election, and this folio does not cover them.

Each party’s assessment is one click away.

ACDPRead the assessment →ActionSARead the assessment →AMMRead the assessment →ANCRead the assessment →BOSARead the assessment →DARead the assessment →EFFRead the assessment →FF PlusRead the assessment →GOODRead the assessment →IFPRead the assessment →SACPRead the assessment →UDMRead the assessment →

Each button opens that party’s assessment on ukweli.io in a new tab, so this page stays open. Party logos belong to the parties and are shown for identification only. Ukweli is not affiliated with any party.

What Ukweli does not do. It does not score, grade, rank or endorse any party. It does not say whether a promise will be kept or whether it is affordable. A promise outside a council’s powers is not a false promise.

Figures in this section as at 22 October 2026. They come from the IEC, the Constitution’s schedules and Ukweli’s 2026 manifesto pages (sources at the end), and they move when a manifesto is added or the IEC publishes a new figure. Errors: hello@ukweli.io.

Who is responsible for a party’s own conduct and general pledges? #

South Africa has three spheres of government: national, provincial and local. A council is the local sphere. The matters a council has the right to run are listed in Part B of Schedule 4 and Part B of Schedule 5 of the Constitution (section 156(1)(a)). National or provincial law can assign it more (section 156(1)(b)). Ukweli’s table of powers holds 38 matters from those two lists, 15 from Schedule 4 and 23 from Schedule 5, and checks each promise against them. The table holds only those 38 matters. Folio 08 explains how.

None of the 38 matters is about a party’s candidates, a code of conduct, a pledge or a coalition. We checked the wording of all 38 by word search. These are things a party decides for itself. They are not things a council does.

The law does set one code of conduct for every councillor, whatever the party. The Municipal Structures Act says the Code of Conduct “applies to every member of a municipal council” (section 21A) and sets it out in Schedule 7. A party’s own code for its candidates is a separate thing. This folio is about the party’s own. It does not compare any promise with the statutory code.

What the party conduct and general pledges are #

We counted every promise in the twelve manifestos that the comparison page files under “Party conduct and general pledges”, one of its ten themes. We found 189, from all twelve manifestos. Some sentences hold more than one promise, and we count each separately. Each promise sits under one theme only.

Two kinds of sentence are filed here. Some are about the party and its people: how candidates are chosen, what councillors will sign, how the party will act in coalition talks. The rest are general pledges, such as “We will use every power available to each municipality.” (ActionSA, file page 10).

Every example on this page follows one rule. For each example, this folio takes the parties in alphabetical order, as in the party table, and skips any party already quoted on this page. If every party with a matching sentence has been quoted, the list starts again. It then uses that party’s first matching sentence in the manifesto, counting from the first page of the file. A matching sentence has the group, kind or word the example is there to show, is not written entirely in capital letters, and runs to no more than 30 words. Where only one party has a sentence that fits, or where the list is complete, that sentence is used. That covers the one sentence inside a council’s powers, the first-person sentences and the two outside sentences that name no subject. A sentence used only because it is the single fit does not count as already quoted. Page numbers on this page are the page of the manifesto file, not the number printed on the page. A quoted sentence says nothing about its party or about the others.

A low count here does not mean a manifesto is silent on these subjects. A promise is filed under one theme only, and many sentences about coalitions, ethics or accountability are filed under other themes. A word search of the promises under every other theme, for coalition, code of conduct, integrity, ethic, corrupt or accountab, finds 162. Every one of the twelve parties has at least three of them. A theme count says where a promise is filed, not what a manifesto contains.

Party by party #

All twelve parties have at least one promise filed under this theme. The counts say how many promises are filed here for each party. They say nothing about how any party behaves, how good a promise is, or how much of a manifesto is about the subject. Ten of the twelve parties have at least one promise in the group “A party’s own conduct”. GOOD and IFP have none filed in this group. GOOD has 4 and IFP has 7 of the 162 promises under other themes that the word search finds.

A party’s own conduct #

114 of the 153 assessed promises (74.5%) are filed in this group. Ukweli puts a promise here when the sentence names no matter a council runs. Many are about what a party or its people will do. Others are general pledges. Across all 1,865 assessed promises from the 12 manifestos combined, on every topic, 216 (11.6%) are in this group. 114 of those 216 are filed under this theme. The other 102 are under other themes, 80 of them under “Running the council”. Ukweli does not test whether such a sentence is kept.

To see what is in the group, we sorted the 114 by the words in each sentence. This is a word search by this folio. Each sentence is counted once, in the order listed. The words show what a sentence mentions, not what it commits to.

The 52 that use none of those words are general pledges by this folio’s word search. Some speak of services or of a municipality working. Ukweli’s finding is the same for them: it found no matter among the 38 that the sentence names.

Some examples, each in the party’s words:

• Coalition: “These principles will guide UDM councillors, UDM-led municipalities, and any coalition or governance arrangement in which the UDM participates.” (UDM, file page 4).
• Candidates and councillors: “The Councillor shall at all times remain loyal to Afrika Mayibuye Movement, its leadership structures, its Constitution, its Restoration Manifesto, and its collective decisions.” (AMM, file page 92).
• First person: “I solemnly undertake to serve the people of South Africa with discipline, honesty, integrity, and revolutionary commitment.” (EFF, file page 77).

12 of the 114 are written in the first person, as an undertaking by one person. All 12 are in the EFF manifesto.

The 114 are not all the same kind of promise. Ukweli records what kind of act each sentence commits to:

• Deliverable (10): the sentence commits to doing or providing something, and a reader could later check whether it happened. For example: “Every ANC councillor will sign a Public Performance Agreement and Pledge of Ethical Conduct.” (ANC, file page 14).
• Aspiration (82): the sentence states a result or an attitude the party wants but names no act that would produce it. For example: “Whilst BOSA understands that this declaration needs approval from the national government tier, our commitment is to use local government levers, powers, and interventions towards their advocacy.” (BOSA, file page 18).
• Process (15): the sentence commits to how the work is organised or overseen, rather than to the result itself.
• Type not settled (7): no kind is shown. Ukweli’s data records the kind as not checked.

An aspiration is not a worse promise than a deliverable. The kind says only whether the sentence names an act that could be checked.

Why a council’s lists do not cover these pledges. Take the sentences that mention a coalition, candidates or councillors. How a party picks its candidates, what it asks them to sign and what it asks for in coalition talks are the party’s decisions. They are not matters on a council’s lists. Ukweli files the general pledges here too. Ukweli files all of these promises under their own group, because it found no matter among the 38 that any of them is about. Ukweli does not test whether any of them is kept, and does not say that any council function has failed.

Who a voter can hold to them. The candidate who asks for your vote, and the party they stand for. A voter can ask the candidate in person, ask for the answer in writing, and keep it for the next election. Ukweli does not say whether any party keeps these pledges, and this folio gives no view of any party’s record. It also does not assess whether any of them can be enforced in law.

Inside a council’s own powers #

One of the 153 assessed promises (0.7%) is on a matter the Constitution gives a council: “Building resilience into municipal planning.” (DA, file page 46). Ukweli ties it to the matter “Municipal planning” on Part B of Schedule 4. Across all 1,865 assessed promises from the 12 manifestos combined, on every topic, 392 (21.0%) are within a council’s own powers.

Led by another sphere, council has a role #

None of the 153 assessed promises is here. Across all 1,865 assessed promises on every topic, 189 (10.1%) are led by another sphere. For party conduct and general pledges the count is nil.

How the council runs itself #

The 31 promises here (20.3%) are about the council’s own machinery: how it reports, sets its rules and works with others. Nine of the twelve parties have at least one. For example: “Processes will be scrutinised to ensure that their decisions are just and transparent;” (ACDP, file page 6) and “Public-private partnerships will also be used to mobilise additional funding” (DA, file page 16). They sit apart from the 114 because they are about how the council works, not about the party.

Outside a council’s powers #

Seven promises (4.6%) are outside a council’s powers, as Ukweli placed them. Two are about immigration and border control (ACDP, file page 8; BOSA, file page 18). Two are about local economic development, jobs and enterprise (ACDP, file page 9; AMM, file page 35). One is about national and provincial oversight of municipalities (IFP, file page 16). Two name no subject: “Oppose the planned national digital ID roll-out.” (ACDP, file page 12) and “usher in a dispensation where all groups and communities enjoy equal rights.” (FF Plus, file page 34). A promise outside a council’s powers is not a false one.

The promises with no verdict #

36 of the 189 (19.0%) carry no verdict. Across all 2,419 promises the share is 22.9%, so this theme is lower. In the reasons below, a “check” is a further test that Ukweli runs on a placement, to see whether it holds. The reasons:

Of the 31 that could not be assessed, 9 are short lines of eight words or fewer, such as “fast-track basic services to these areas” (ACDP, file page 9) and “deliver reliable services to every community” (ActionSA, file page 19). We do not fill the gap by guessing.

Take “Mayibuye local leaders will help facilitate strategic partnerships focused on co-creating knowledge, aligning local economic development (LED), sharing municipal infrastructure, and building institutional capacity.” (AMM, file page 20). Ukweli marked it as mixing matters that fall under different powers, so one verdict would be wrong for part of it. We do not guess. The card says so.

Our view #

This is the folio’s own view. It is kept apart from the counts above.

Much of what is filed under this theme is a different kind of promise from the rest of this series. The 114 in the group “A party’s own conduct” name no matter on a council’s lists, and Ukweli does not test whether anyone keeps them. A voter can still use them. If a party has written a pledge down, the voter can ask the candidate to repeat it, ask where it can be read, and ask who the party answers to if it is broken. General pledges give a voter less that can be checked than pledges that name an act.

Questions to put to any candidate #

1. Which of your party’s pledges to its councillors will you sign, and where can a resident read the signed copy?
2. If no party wins a majority, what will you put in writing before coalition talks begin, and who will see it?
3. When your manifesto says you will provide services or listen, which service, in which ward, by what date, and how will residents see progress?
4. If a councillor breaks a party pledge, who does a resident complain to: the party, the council, or both?

Promises counted in two folios #

Each promise sits under one theme only. So none of these 189 is also in the Safety folio (Folio 10), the water folio (Folio 11), the electricity folio (Folio 12) or the waste folio (Folio 13). Folio 09 collects immigration promises from every theme, and two of the 189 are also among its 16: ACDP (file page 8) and BOSA (file page 18), both placed outside a council’s powers. Folio 09 shows them as ACDP, page 5 (file page 8) and BOSA, file page 18 with no printed number. The 39 assessed promises that are within a council’s powers, about how it runs itself, or outside them are among the 1,649 promises about council business that Folio 08 counts across every topic. The 114 about a party’s own conduct are not in that count. Each folio stands alone.