Eastern Cape IEC officials quit amid intimidation claims

Intimidation of Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) staff in Ntabankulu in the Eastern Cape has led to the resignation of officials at two voting stations.

IEC Eastern Cape electoral officer Kayakazi Magudumana told media police had to take over the running of the two stations which only opened at 2.30pm.

“There are two stations in Ntabankulu, in ward 17, and those two stations are where we received resignations [of IEC officials] ... [there were] people intimidating voting station staff.

“It’s people that have their own issues about service delivery and because of their unhappiness about the whole issue of voting they started intimidating staff working in those two stations.

“We had to release them and the two stations now are manned by [an] SAPS contingency,” said Magudumana.

She said even if no-one from the community came to vote at the two stations they would remain open.

“They [protesters] are still outside the stations to intimidate people not to go in.”

Magudumana said another issue was a high number of party agents who were turned away by IEC officials at voting stations, asking them to bring additional information.

“We were able to send bulk SMSes [to presiding officers] to correct whatever was understood [by the officers],” she said.

There were also problems with voter management devices (VMD), forcing officials to stop using them and use voters’ rolls to facilitate voting.

“VMD is a device procured to enhance our administration work; it does not mean voting is less legitimate because there is no device,” she said.

Asked if the IEC would extend the time of voting at the stations that opened late, Magudumana said the commission had not received any request for extension of time, but should it come, she would send it to the national office for a decision.

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