The chief executive officer of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), Mr. Sy Mamabolo, has ordered political parties to quickly prepare the list of people they will vote for in the upcoming elections.
Mamabolo said that many of the cases they were resolving in the 2024 national and provincial elections were about complaints from party delegates.
“The parties must, by July 30, finalize the list of the people they will represent. There are many cases that we had to resolve that concerned the people who will be appointed by the parties in the 2024 elections,” said Mamabolo yesterday when they were talking about the preparations for the elections, at the committee of the Ministry of Home Affairs in Parliament.
Mamabolo said there will be two weekends to register to vote before the election.
“The first one was announced to be held on June 20 and 21. The second one will be held at the beginning of August.”
He said they expect the date of the election in August to be officially included in the government document. This will be done by the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Indigenous Affairs in the country, Mr. Velenkosini Hlabisa.
Hlabisa is expected to announce the election date before the end of June. Elections are expected to be held in November or January.
Mrs. Dawn Mbatha, the chief financial officer at the commission, said they have a budget of R4.75 billion this financial year.
He said they are discussing with the Treasury Department about the money as it is being considered for the election. Mamabolo said they are strengthening their plans so that there are no complaints about the election results.
“We will also invite political parties to bring researchers who will look at the results system we are using so that there are no complaints. There were complaints in the 2024 election about problems affecting the board that reveals the election results,” he said.
These challenges made many groups cry. The board was off for a long time. As it happens, the MKP wants the next election to be postponed, complaining that it must be held once the complaint it lodged regarding the results of the 2024 election has been resolved.
The IEC rejected MKP’s complaints and the case filed by this group is expected to be heard in the Electoral Court next month.
The leader of MKP, Mr. Jacob Zuma, said that rushing to have another election when there is no decision in the case they have filed will cause people not to trust the results of the election.
“We have to tell them that we want to know where our stolen votes went in the last election. Let’s tell them that we don’t want another election because there are problems they haven’t solved yet,” said Zuma.