A coalition government is emerging in South Africa for the first time in the country's history following parliamentary elections.
With just under 52% of the votes counted, the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party had 41.93% of the total on Friday morning, according to the National Electoral Commission (IEC).
The preliminary result means a large-scale loss of around 15 percentage points for the ruling party, which secured 57.5% of the vote in the last parliamentary elections held in 2019.
If the former party of anti-apartheid campaigner Nelson Mandela remains below the 50% mark, as is now considered likely, it will have to form a coalition.
In the past 30 years, since the beginning of democracy in 1994, the ANC has always won an absolute majority and ruled the continent's strongest economy alone.
In the preliminary results the economically liberal Democratic Alliance (DA) came in at 23.43%, while the party founded only six months ago by former President Jacob Zuma, uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), is on 10.58%. The Marxist-influenced Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party follows close behind with 9.78%.
According to the preliminary results, the ANC will also lose its absolute majority in the country's economically strongest province, Gauteng, which includes the capital Pretoria and the economic centre of Johannesburg.
The ANC is also expected to fall below 50% in KwaZulu-Natal, Zuma's home province.
The country's second strongest province economically, the Western Cape, where Cape Town is located, has been governed for years by the DA. The preliminary results suggest it will retain its absolute majority there.
Members of 52 parties competed for the 400 seats in the National Assembly on May 29. The newly elected parliament must form a government and elect a president within 14 days of the announcement of the final results.
The ANC's historic electoral losses can be attributed to its weak record in government. The country of 61 million people is currently facing an ailing economy, mass unemployment and struggling state-owned companies. There are regular power cuts as well as high levels of crime and corruption.