The DA has filed an urgent application in the Electoral Court against ActionSA, the EFF, the MK Party and GOOD, alleging they are bending the rules governing candidate lists in this year’s Local Government Elections.
The DA alleges these parties have deliberately submitted their proportional representation (PR) lists with only one name on them, which they say is a ploy to hide their candidates from voters.
According to electoral rules, parties are allowed to supplement lists after the election if they win more seats than they initially submitted candidates for.
But the DA charges that these parties are bending the rules and attempting to mislead voters by misinterpreting the law.
DA Federal Council Chairperson Ashor Sarupen says it is the principle that is at stake.
“Parties are required to present voters with the names of their candidates before voters go into a voting booth to choose their political parties, not after the votes have been counted.”
“The courts have consistently held that voters’ rights to information ahead of voting are sacrosanct, requiring the disclosure of party political funding and other matters. The DA will stand up for this principle, on behalf of voters who should not be hoodwinked by this tactic from ActionSA, the EFF, MK or GOOD.”
Sarupen says the law in question was not crafted to allow parties to hide or conceal their candidates from voters and wait for the election to be done before submitting names to the IEC.
“Doing this is a perversion of the very meaning of a candidate election, and is deeply disrespectful to South African voters. The law was only intended to cover situations where parties make entirely unexpected and fortuitous surges in support and end up winning a few more PR seats than their lists could cover before the election.”
The EFF is contesting almost every ward in South Africa, with thousands of individual ward candidates, while submitting just one PR candidate in every municipality.
ActionSA has nominated more than 2,000 individual ward candidates while submitting one-person PR lists in virtually every municipality it contests. In Johannesburg, where it currently has dozens of PR councillors, it has submitted just one PR candidate.
MK has similarly fielded candidates across thousands of wards while submitting one-person PR lists.
GOOD has done the same in municipalities where it already holds multiple PR seats.
“The scale and uniformity of this practice is precisely why the DA has approached the Electoral Court.”
“Voters must be presented with the candidates they are voting for. Elections cannot become games of sleight-of-hand. The ballot box must determine which candidates are elected.”
ActionSA has called the DA’s court action “puerile” and “frivolous” and a bizarre attempt to misuse the courts to pursue a baseless challenge against political opponents.
