Eastern Cape IEC officials quit amid intimidation claims

Intimidation of IEC staff in Ntabankulu has led to the resignation of officials at two voting stations.

This is according to the Eastern Cape IEC provincial electoral officer, Kayakazi Magudumana, who was updating the media on the process of the voting on election day.

According to Magudumana, police have had to take over the running of the two stations which only opened at 14:30.

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

“It’s people that are having their own issues around service delivery issues and because of their unhappiness on the whole issue of voting, they started intimidating staff that is 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 not one from the community goes to vote at the two stations, they will remain open.

“They [protestors] are still outside the stations to intimidate people in that they should not actually go in,” she said.

Magudumana said they were faced with other issues including a high number of party agents that were turned away by IEC officials at voting stations, asking them to bring additional information.

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

Magudumana said they further had problems with their voter management devices, forcing them to stop using them and just use voters’ rolls to facilitate voting.

“You will remember that VMD is just a device that was procured to enhance our administration work, it does not necessarily mean that our voting is less legitimate because there is no device,” she said.

She said if the devices had been working, the IEC would have the actual number of people who have already voted.

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

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