By Annisa Essack

03:11:2021

Former IEC Commissioner, Terry Tselane, spoke to Radio Islam today to provide his assessment of how the IEC has handled the Local Government Elections 2021.

Tselane says that the IEC had five years to prepare for the current election, and therefore there should be no excuse for problems they have experienced issues pertaining to the voters roll and ballot papers.

“Those things should not be problems now. We dealt with these things in 1998 when we established the IEC. I don’t expect, in this day and age, for this kind of problem to be recurring within the Commission.”

He explained that the problems experienced would compromise the Commission’s ability to deliver, and it should not be applicable.

On deploying the ZipZap machines, he says that they should have tested the systems before deploying them. However, he added that the machines would be assisting in the long run.

Regarding the role of the IEC in terms of voter education, Tselane says that the criticism against the IEC regarding low voter turnout is misplaced.

“Political parties have the responsibility. They have to understand that they must mobilise, excite and invite people to be part of the process. If they can’t get their supporters to go to the voting station, then what do they expect the IEC to do? Drag them from their homes to go to the voting stations?” “And therefore, they can’t now put that squarely on the shoulders of the Commission and expect the Commission to take the blame for low voter turnout.”

Speaking further on low voter turnout, Tselane says that political parties have discredited the whole democratic process, and people see no value in participating in the elections.

“There was a very organised non-participation. That non-participation in the election is actually participation; it’s a vote.

He added that the low voter turnout is an important and profound message to the political parties.

He says he is surprised that the IEC is slow regarding the vote count, and he could not provide reasons for the slow progress.

“It seems as if the information is not being captured because remember that the results have already been counted. What is left now is capturing the information in the system.”

Tselane says it is interesting to note the number of hung municipalities, particularly as the vote count was not completed. He says the question arising from this situation is what to do with the hung councils.

He added that current coalitions, which he called “hot and sweet”, are unsustainable  — no relationship, no principles guiding the coalitions.”

Tselane says coalitions need to be regulated with processes to ensure that they do not enter and leave as they wish.

[LISTEN] to the podcast here.