IEC reports faster results processing as Zille happy with DA performance

The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) says the 2026 local government election results are being processed at a faster pace than during the previous municipal elections, with 18 municipalities having completed the results process by 9am on Thursday.

IEC chief electoral officer Sy Mamabolo said the commission had received 23,444 results slips, representing 35.5% of the 66,073 expected results from local municipalities, metros and district councils across the country’s 23,000 voting stations.

“Of these, 22,983 results slips, representing 34.8%, had been captured into the results system, while 16,791, or 25%, had undergone independent auditing.”

Comparing the progress with the 2021 local government elections, Mamabolo said: “In a comparative election in 2021 and at the same time, only seven municipalities had been completed.”

He said the improved rate of capturing was achieved despite longer ballot papers, an increased number of contestants and expectations of greater voter participation.

Mamabolo emphasised that several safeguards had been put in place to protect the integrity and transparency of the results process.

He described these measures as “an important watermark of a free and fair election”, explaining that results slips were captured in duplicate in the presence of political party agents and observers at counting stations.

“The agents can record and make photographic images of the results. Similarly, the IEC makes an image of the results to facilitate retrieval by contestants where this may be required,” he said.

After counting, results slips are transported in tamper-evident envelopes to the commission’s local capturing sites.

Mamabolo said the capturing process included pre-quality assurance measures, double-blind capturing, scanning of results slips and independent auditing of the entire population of results.

“Meaning that the audit is not a sampled audit, but the entire results are subjected to this important assurance measure,” he said.

He said another layer of protection was the use of an automated results system to identify possible anomalies, including excessive voter turnout and discrepancies in the votes received by a political party at the same voting station across different ballot types.

Meanwhile, DA Joburg mayoral candidate Helen Zille expressed optimism about the party’s performance as the counting process continued, saying she believed it could emerge as Gauteng’s biggest party.

“I’m anticipating that we will be the biggest party in Gauteng, and we’ll see what we can do with the result after this,” she said.

However, Zille was careful to limit her comments to Johannesburg, saying she could not speak on behalf of the party nationally because she was no longer its leader or chairperson of its federal council.

“I can only speak for Johannesburg, where I’m the mayoral candidate,” she said.

Asked whether she believed the results would reflect the party’s hands-on campaign, Zille said she felt the efforts had largely paid off, although reaching voters remained challenging.

“I think for the most part, probably yes, but it’s a bit of a challenge sometimes, you know, to break through,” she said.

Reflecting on voter participation, Zille said she would have preferred a higher turnout but appreciated those who made their way to voting stations.

“It could have been a better turnout, but we were grateful for those who did,” she said.

With the results process continuing, the IEC maintained that its verification and auditing measures were intended to ensure that the figures eventually announced accurately reflected the choices made by voters.

Sowetan