Despite boycott, few cast vote in Orania

Despite media reports that the Afrikaner community of Orania in the North West would be boycotting the municipal elections, 65 residents came out to vote on Wednesday.

Out of these, 34 people, or 53% voted for the Freedom Front Plus.

The DA gained 19 votes, while the ANC received nine votes, and the Congress of the People received three.

Freedom Front Plus leader in Gauteng, Jaco Mulder, said that many of the people who vote are farmworkers. The majority of residents in Orania ‘do not participate” in the elections, he said.

Earlier this month, the SABC reported that while the rest of the country voted in the municipal elections, many residents of the Afrikaner community in Orania would be voting in their own private town council elections.

Voting, however, will still go ahead, and the community will end up with a councillor who most of them did not vote for.

The community remains aspirational to independence from South Africa, even though their attempts to gain independence in 2000 were unsuccessful.