ANC faces race against time to save 181 election candidates

The ANC is taking desperate, last-ditch action to legally challenge an Electoral Court ruling which bars 181 of its candidates from standing in six municipal elections in November. Win or lose, though, the party has already been dealt a lasting blow, says a political analyst. Court ruling leaves ANC under pressure Political analyst André Duvenhage earlier said the court’s ruling could have a lasting impact in the legacy of ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula and the party’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa.

“You can also see this point from the perspective of poor administration and a lack of consensus among the candidates,” he said. “If the current lists of the ANC are be revealed, you would see a lot of internal conflict before the elections.” Asked whether the ANC’s predicament was possibly a result of friendly fire, Duvenhage said there was high possibility of sabotage within the party. “I have no doubt that there are forces within the ANC and outside the ANC who would like to see the current system of the ANC fail,” he said.

“I believe there is an ongoing project to get rid of the Ramaphosa grouping within the ANC and reunite it with other groupings, like the EFF and uMkhonto weSizwe party, as a strategy towards 2029.” IEC moves ahead with election preparations The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) said yesterday it had plans to move forward with the publication of 136 790 candidates who will contest the elections on 4 November. The IEC will print ballot papers shortly thereafter. This election cycle offers 10 526 seats across various municipalities, up from 10 478 in 2021.

Given this tight timeline, the ANC faces an uphill battle in resolving its legal issues before candidates are completely left out. After the paper draw ceremony on Wednesday, 23 September, the IEC will begin preparing to print the ballot papers once it issues the final candidate list. As it stands, 181 ANC candidates are at risk of exclusion, their fates resting in the hands of the judicial process after the party lost its case in the Electoral Court yesterday but has vowed to appeal.

The IEC’s announcement suggests the ANC will be unable to resubmit its candidate list to the electoral authority, though the party still has other legal avenues to pursue. ANC blames technical glitches for missed deadline This is the first time since the democratic elections in 1994 and the local e… Yesterday was one of the first proper FAFO (Fool Around and Find Out) moments in South Africa’s post-1994 history, as the Electoral Court endorsed the clear message sent to the ANC by the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC): A deadline is a deadline.

The IEC was doing what it is supposed to, according to its mandate and what the law requires. The rules for elections state clearly that if nominations for candidates have not been submitted by a certain time, then they are null and void. As with much else that it touches, this election candidate submission process turned into brown, smelly stuff for the ANC which, clearly, faced some of its usual “challenges”.