Johannesburg – The Johannesburg High Court has ruled that the ANC acted unlawfully and unconstitutionally when it removed Andile Lungisa from its proportional representation (PR) candidate list for Nelson Mandela Bay.
The court ordered the party to restore Lungisa’s name to its internal candidate list, declaring his removal unlawful, invalid and unconstitutional.
However, the ruling does not automatically put him on the ballot for the 4 November local government elections.
According to IOL’s report on the judgment, Judge NP Mali ordered the ANC, its secretary-general Fikile Mbalula and its national executive committee to restore Lungisa’s name immediately and pay his legal costs on a punitive attorney-and-client scale.
The case followed Lungisa’s challenge to his exclusion from the party’s list after he had been nominated by ANC branches in Nelson Mandela Bay and ranked as the top candidate at the provincial list conference.
He was later shortlisted and publicly announced by ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa as a mayoral candidate for the metro.
Lungisa argued that his name was removed shortly before the list was submitted to the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC).
The ANC maintained that he had not completed the required candidate-vetting process. Mbalula denied personally ordering his removal, saying he had acted on an instruction from the party’s electoral committee.
Andile Lungisa vs ANC judgment… https://t.co/zoQ2iJNBBq
— Yusuf Abramjee (@Abramjee) October 9, 2026
However, the court found that the ANC had not adequately explained the basis for treating Lungisa as disqualified or identified a rule that allowed the secretary-general to remove him from the final list unilaterally.
The judge said political parties were constitutional actors in an electoral democracy and that their candidate-selection processes were directly linked to political rights.
The court also addressed the practical limits of changing candidate lists after the IEC’s submission deadline.
IOL reported that the IEC could only accept Lungisa’s name on a supplementary list, which may be called for after the election if the ANC’s list contains fewer candidates than the number of seats it wins. The judge ordered that his name be included on any such list.
The ruling follows weeks of tension within the ANC over Lungisa’s political future and his bid to become mayor of Nelson Mandela Bay.
The party’s first deputy secretary-general, Nomvula Mokonyane, had urged the ANC to resolve the dispute internally rather than allow it to escalate through the courts.
The SABC previously reported that the court had reserved judgment after hearing arguments from Lungisa, the ANC and Mbalula.
Lungisa’s eligibility had also been questioned because of his past assault conviction. He was sentenced in 2018 after striking DA councillor Ryno Kayser with a glass jug during a Nelson Mandela Bay council meeting in 2016.
Lungisa argued that the constitutional five-year period of disqualification had expired, while the ANC raised concerns about his vetting and criminal-record status.
The court rejected Lungisa’s request to hold Mbalula personally liable, finding that the evidence did not establish bad faith or a personal motive.
The judgment is a setback for the ANC’s handling of its candidate-selection process in Nelson Mandela Bay, although the practical effect on Lungisa’s prospects of becoming a councillor will depend on the available supplementary-list process and the election outcome.
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Compiled by Glaan Sibuyi
