ANC passes 10-million votes

As the African National Congress passed the 10-million vote mark on Friday, the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) said that the turnout for the third democratic elections had been an impressive 76,9%.

At present the ANC has 69,6% of the vote or 9 749 918 with less than 10% of the vote still to be collated.

The IEC said on Friday that the percentage of spoilt ballots had been at a record low of 1,161%.

”Ideally we don’t want any ballots to be spoilt, but this is really good going. This is one of the best we have had,” said IEC Chief Electoral Officer Mosotho Moepya at a press briefing at the IEC headquarters in Pretoria.

According to the IEC, 95% of the results have been captured and 90% audited. Capturing and auditing was moving ”well and fast”. The IEC also said that about 33 133 prisoners voted in the elections countrywide.

Moepya emphasised that the voter turnout figures were provisional and not precise and could only be finalised once all the votes had been counted. The ”preliminary” results for the elections are expected to be certified over the weekend by the IEC, but they hoped to be ”wrapping up” the election by the end of tomorrow, barring unforeseen circumstances.

The IEC also said that ”all the disputes and issues we had to clarify” had been dealt with ”satisfactorily”, but that police were still investigating the issue of the missing ballot boxes in KwaZulu-Natal.

Of the nine provinces, only three have finished counting votes. These are the Northern Cape, Western Cape and Mpumalanga.

KwaZulu-Natal is the province with the most outstanding voting districts, with 633 districts outstanding by early Friday morning. These votes represent 18% of the poll in the hotly contested province.

Gauteng had results from 342 districts outstanding from the Tshwane and Ekurhuleni. Limpopo was waiting for 20 districts to submit results, including the sparsely populated Kruger National Park. In the Eastern Cape EC, all districts had submitted their results except for Umtata and surrounding areas, which comprise of 211 districts.

The Democratic Alliance has boosted its score as official opposition growing from 9,56% of the vote in the 1999 election to 12,68% — but with returns from largely black rural areas still to come in this percentage is likely to slip further.

At present it can count on about 50 seats in the 400 seat National Assembly — up from the 37 it achieved in 1999 and up from the 48 it held before parliament rose this year as a result of floor crossing. Its share of the vote is substantially down from the 23% achieved nationally when the Democratic Party and the New National Party joined together in the Democratic Alliance to fight the 2000 municipal election.

‘We seek a decisive mandate’

The ANC thanked its supporters on Thursday night for electing a government of their choice.

Former president F W de Klerk, who played a major role in ending apartheid, cautioned that few parties had reason to rejoice.

”It already seems clear that we are still caught up in the logjams of the past — the African National Congress still wields more power than is healthy for any democracy.”

The ANC said in a statement it was humbled by the vote of confidence: ”It’s too early to make any definitive conclusions, but quite clearly, the trend reflects the fact that the overwhelming majority of South Africans have given the ANC a decisive mandate to implement programmes to fight poverty and create work.”

While foreign media and commentators pointed to the ANC’s increasing lead, President Thabo Mbeki said on Tuesday the ANC would not seek to change the constitution if it won a two-thirds majority.

He said the ANC never said it wanted a two-thirds majority but ”we seek a decisive mandate from the people of South Africa”.