Race for W Cape, KZN proves tight

As expected, the race for control of the South African provinces of the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal remains tight.

In the Western Cape, with 23% of the votes counted, the African National Congress (ANC) was only slightly ahead of the official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA), with early figures indicating that a hung legislature could result.

The ANC was leading with 36,9%, with the DA polling 35,7%. The New National Party (NNP), which was once dominant in the province, slipped behind the DA with 11,74%.

A strong ”fourth force” was Patricia de Lille’s Independent Democrats with 8,11%. The ACDP was polling 3,25% and the Freedom Front Plus with 1,29%. The other parties polled 3% collectively.

If the trend holds, the ANC will not have a sufficient majority even with its political partner, the NNP, falling short of the critical 50% threshold.

However, with the rural votes likely to be the last counted, the ANC is likely to strengthen its position.

Nevertheless a coalition government, possibly of opposition parties, could be an upset result.

The NNP got 38% of the vote in 1999 in the Western Cape, so it looks as if its support has dropped more than two thirds in its key stronghold.

In KwaZulu-Natal, the ANC currently holds 42,88%, with the IFP in second position with 40%, followed by the DA with 8,75%. However, again the rural vote, which will be the last to be counted, is likely to favour the IFP.

In all the other provinces, the ANC is on course for victory. In Gauteng it has garnered 53,.4% so far, followed by the DA with 34%, while in the Eastern Cape, the ANC has 75,89% of the vote, followed by the DA with 13,67%, SABC news reported.

Two ballot boxes go missing

Police are investigating the theft of two ballot boxes at Creighton in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands, Director Bala Naidoo said on Thursday.

The boxes contain special votes and went missing after polls closed.

Details of the theft are still very sketchy and it is unknown if one of the ballot boxes found on the side of road in the area had votes in it. The other ballot box is still missing.

Police are waiting for Independent Electoral Commission officials to reach the scene because police are not allowed to open the box

Smooth election, despite bomb scares

In general, the election appears to have gone off smoothly with few major incidents. Voting was marred at three polling stations by bomb scares — in Johannesburg, Pretoria, and Durban — all of which proved to be hoaxes.

The Pretoria North police station, doubling as a polling station, was evacuated when it received a bomb threat from an anonymous caller just after 6pm. Nothing was found.

Shortly after voting started at the Durban City Hall, police received information of a bomb in the building, Durban police reported.

People were escorted out the building and the area was cordoned off, but again, nothing was found.

In the third incident, security was stepped up around Gauteng’s elections results centre following reports of a bomb scare.

Members of the bomb disposal and dog units of the SA Police Service rushed to the centre on Wednesday morning when claims of a bomb surfaced, but nothing was found.

Apart from these, one of the more serious other incidents occurred in Botshabelo in the Free State, when four Democratic Alliance members were arrested and then released on bail of R100 each after being detained in cells for four hours.

Advocate Pieter Geldenhuys, responsible for organising their release, said he had to drive to Botshabelo before police would release the men.

DA MPL Darryl Worth and three other DA members allegedly drove into a voting station in a vehicle bearing a DA logo.

”Seventeen police officers and five cars surrounded the members in an American-style arrest. This is a complete over-reaction and an abuse of state power,” said DA spokesperson Andries Botha.

Election rules dictate that no electioneering may take place at a voting station.

ANC mystified by IFP sticker charge

Voter registration stickers that were seized by police at a hostel in Durban on Wednesday were for 107 people who had registered to vote in the election, KwaZulu-Natal chief Electoral Officer Mawethu Mosery said.

However, he said that these people would have been able to cast their ballot as their names were on the voters’ roll.

Mosery told reporters at a late night briefing in the city that the stickers were issued by the IEC registration machine on December 2, 2003 and January 20, 2004.

Police spokesperson Director Bala Naidoo said there had been no arrests. Police, however, were investigating the incident.

Earlier in the day, a BBC radio reporter who was at the SJ Smith hostel in Merebank saw a man, who said he was an ANC member, with a roll of stickers. However, he did not see the man placing the stickers into identity books.

The IFP has lodged a complaint with election authorities after claiming that ANC reporters were seen placing the stickers into the ID books of voters.

Responding to the allegations, the ANC said in a statement: ”It is a mystery to the ANC as to how the IFP came to conclude that the individuals concerned are members of the ANC. We believe that anyone who violated the electoral law should be arrested and charged.

”The ANC secretary general (Kgalema Motlanthe) has also requested the national commissioner of the police to investigate this matter and assured him of our full co-operation.”

The ANC said it was concerned that the IFP’s complaint ”may be intended to lay the basis of a rejection of the election results should they not favour the IFP”.

Three die at polling stations

A Limpopo woman who collapsed at a polling station in Greater Letaba outside Tzaneen was among three who died during Wednesday’s voting, SABC radio news reported.

Officials said the woman — named only as Mrs Makananisa — collapsed immediately after casting her vote.

Earlier, an Eastern Cape man Popana Zeti (70) died while waiting to vote at a station in Macleantown.

And the IEC in the Western Cape confirmed that a voter died at the St Cyprians polling station in Cape Town while waiting to vote.

Details of the cause of death and identity of the voter were not yet known, SABC reported.

International observers ‘impressed’

An IEC presiding officer at the City Hall polling station, Rashaad Solomon, said international observers from Canada who were stationed at his station were impressed by the voting process.

”The observers said our election process was very much similar to their elections in Canada and they were very impressed. They also timed voters and found that the voting process per person was under two minutes.”

By 10pm on Wednesday, streets in suburbs south of Johannesburg were quiet, with an air of peace and calm as IEC officials began the counting process. ‒ Staff reporter and Sapa