EASTERN CAPE - EC OPPOSITION PARTIES CRY FOUL OVER IEC "FAILURE TO DETECT DOUBLE VOTING"

Opposition parties in the Eastern Cape have cried foul of the IEC’s "failure to detect double voting" saying though the elections were peaceful in the province on Wednesday, their fairness have been thrown into tatters.

Opposition parties, speaking to the Independent Media, say they have raised the matter with IEC officials in the province “who have escalated the matter” to their national colleagues.

Zama Ntshona, the Eastern Cape spokesperson for ATM, says: “We have witnessed for ourselves where people provided us with proof that the indelible ink disappears after being applied. This has contributed to people voting more than once.”

“Before there is a declaration of these elections being free and fair we need a data analysis to tell us the extent of the damage,” Ntshona said.

PAC provincial chairperson Sandla Goqwana said: “These elections were free but to a very large extent they were not fair. People voted more than once.”

DA’s Eastern Cape leader Nqaba Bhanga said they were told by IEC officials that it was not immediate possible to detect double voting.

“The IEC was very honest here in the Eastern Cape who told us exactly of the challenges they are confronted with. They have confirmed that indeed people can move from one station to the other and double vote,” Bhanga said.

Azapo’s Eastern Cape secretary Chris Swepu said: “In terms of the fairness we have raised our concerns not criticising how the IEC in province conducted elections but how their system, in general, allowed people to vote more than once.”

In a statement on Thursday afternoon the IEC Chief Electoral Officer Sy Mamabolo said the commission will urgently conduct an audit results to ascertain if double voting occurred.

“The audit will cover a statistically representative sample of voting stations as well as all voting stations where complaints or allegations of double voting have been received,” Mamabolo said.

Meanwhile a voting station in Ntlangano in Ward 1 in Ntabankulu remains closed on Thursday after a protest by community members over service delivery complaints, denying 591 people to cast their votes.

via - IOL