A Canadian- and Turkish-style 'confidence and supply' agreement -- where the ANC runs the executive and the DA and IFP (perhaps with the EFF) controls the legislature -- is seemingly the most favoured option right now.

Three discussion documents obtained by Daily Maverick, and tabled as ANC NEC talks on power-sharing get under way in Johannesburg on Tuesday 4 June, show the party's possible direction as it wrestles with the options before the 16 June deadline.

The party is leaning toward a so-called "confidence and supply" agreement, possibly with the DA and IFP as its preferred partners, but leaving the door open to other partners too.

Document 1 is written by a young, progressive intellectual in the ANC. It says: "A coalition agreement that impedes the renewal and transformation agenda of the ANC would be a marriage of convenience and would prioritise political expediency over the long-term effects on the ANC and the country as a whole."

It argues that: "For these reasons, the ANC must exclude the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) and Jacob Zuma's Party/uMkhonto Wesizwe Party (MKP) from potential coalition candidates. Such a coalition risks undoing the substantial progress achieved by the ANC government to date."

This paper sets out the differences between the ANC on the one hand and the EFF and MK on the other.

This document says the best option for the country's stability is an ANC-DA-IFP power-sharing agreement. It sets...