COUNTING is underway across the country with preliminary results showing that the DA have once again won Ward 64, 66 and 68. This marks a second straight win for the blue party in the Durban South after winning all three wards in the 2021 Local Government Elections.

Also read: Damaged ballot box in Montclair sparks election security concerns

Preliminary wins

At a media briefing today (November 5), the IEC deputy CEO for Electoral Operations, Masego Sheburi, said that results in circulation are based of the result slips left behind at the voting stations. Sheburi said that result slips are completed in duplicate following the count at the station.

“One is transported to a capturing site and the other is left at the voting station as a way of publicly announcing a provisional result for that station if it has not been altered or tampered with. Treat it as a provisional result until such time the commission announces the final result because that result can be subject to an objection that may lead to a recount and that result changes lawfully,” he said.

Cases still being addressed

According to Sheburi, as of last night the IEC received around 800 complaints lodged by contestants.

“The preponderance of the complaints related to conduct of voting station staff not allowing party agents to observe the counting as well as the voting process. The majority of those objections were closed and determined, only about 106 remain opened. However, the question is much nuanced than the response. There are objections that are dealt by the presiding officer, those would have been dealt with at each voting station. There are complaints raised with us and these are the ones I am talking about,” said Sheburi.

He added there is still opportunity for contestants to raise objections that are material to the outcome of the declared results. The IEC said that all objections need to be in by 17:00 tomorrow (November 6). Sheburi said that once those objections are dealt with by the commission, they will be in a position to indicate when they will announce the final results.

“The commission as we indicated has seven days lawfully to declare the result. The commission does not want to keep the country in angst and for that reason will release the results as soon as all objections have been dealt with. Lawfully the commission cannot release or declare the results before 17:00 tomorrow afternoon,” he said.

Low number at the polls?

The IEC recorded the highest number of registered voters in this election with 29.2 million registered voters. Sheburi said at the current rate, 15.9 million South Africans participated both during special votes and during the elections yesterday. The previous municipal election saw around 12 million voters show up to cast their vote despite having 26 204 579 registered voters.

Delays in eThekwini on the dashboard

The IEC CEO Sy Mamabolo addressed the concerns of eThekwini still not reflecting changes on the IEC results dashboard, attributing the delays to the size of the ballot.

“The reality of the situation is that in all the metros the ballots are quite long. The practical implication of that is that as it takes longer to count it will similarly take longer to capture. In respect of all eight metros, the result capturing process will not be as expeditious as we may want to present merely because of the sheer size of the ballot papers,” said Mamabolo.

The IEC is expected to brief the media again at 16:00.

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