The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) has dismissed reports, especially on the social media platform X, that it manipulated the results of the 2024 National and Provincial Elections.
The allegations were rife on X, with many users arguing that the polls were manipulated and that some parties were robbed.
The confusion was created after the IEC updated its Elections Dashboard last week to reflect the total number of votes from the two National Assembly ballots and final seat allocation (out of 400 seats) for the elections.
“In the 2024 elections registered voters received two ballots for the National Assembly elections: 1 National ballot and 1 Regional ballot, (the 3rd election ballot was for the provincial elections). Just over 16 million registered voters voted, casting some 31.92 million ballots across the nine regional and one national ballot. The Electoral Act prescribes that for the calculation of compensatory seats both national compensatory (N) ballots and regional (R) ballots are taken into account. Hence the demotion of N + R on the results dashboard,” said IEC’s Deputy Communication Manager David Mandaha.
The IEC said this is done to ensure that the allocation of compensatory seats consider the regional strength of all political parties, thus, “meeting the proportional representation in general demanded by the constitution.”
The IEC clarification also comes after the uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MK) leader Jacob Zuma said at the weekend that he is not about to give up on his demand for a rerun of the 2024 general elections.
“For the record, the MK Party is of the strong view that the 2024 elections were rigged and that the results announced by the IEC are not a true reflection of the will of the people. We have also tried peaceful means to address our grievances, but all in vain. We have even approached the highest court in the land, but it rejected our pleas without even giving us a hearing and relying on technicalities while democracy itself is being destroyed,” said Zuma who was briefing the media in Johannesburg on Sunday.
