South African masses line up to vote in the national elections. It was estimated that 80% of the elligible voters cast ballots.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos
ADRIAAN BASSON AND MANDY ROSSOUW
PRETORIA, SOUTH AFRICA
Apr 23 2009 03:04
With more than 300 000 votes counted in this year's general election, the 60% mark continued to elude the ruling African National Congress (ANC).
By 2.30am on Thursday morning the ANC had received 180 433 votes (55,4%) and the Democratic Alliance was in second spot with 87 600 (26,9%) of the vote.
Although only a small fraction of vote has been counted, it became increasingly likely that the DA would once again emerge as the official opposition, beating the new kid on the block, the Congress of the People (Cope).
Cope was struggling to garner any major support in any of the nine provinces. Its best performance so far has been 14% of the Northern Cape vote, which translates into 1 699 votes in the least populated province in South Africa.
If the current voting trend continues, the smaller opposition parties' support will plummet. The latest results show the Independent Democrats on 2,84%, the United Democratic Movement 1,02% and the Inkatha Freedom Party, at 1,81%, were struggling to secure any significant support.
Great tolerance
Meanwhile, observers said on Wednesday that SA sets an exemplary standard for elections.
Only observers from African countries are in South Africa to monitor the national elections.
Observers from the African Union, Pan-African Parliament (PAP), Southern African Development Community (SADC) as well as from Nigeria and Zimbabwe came to see whether the elections are free and fair.
"We are not here for an investigation, rather to show support for the process," Dr Salim Ahmed Salim, who heads the AU observer team said.
"There is no reason for concern here. There are strong institutions and great tolerance despite the past. The state of reconciliation that Madiba started in this country ensured this."
Salim pointed to xenophobic attacks last year as the only significant blot on the country's reconciliation track record.
"There is also so much enthusiasm by young people. It is an example to other countries on the continent," he said.
Source: Mail & Guardian Online
Web Address: http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-04-23-election-results-show-anc-in-early-lead
Thursday, April 23, 2009
05:17 Mecca time, 02:17 GMT
Early lead for ANC in S Africa vote
ANC leader Jacob Zuma is expected to clinch the country's presidency
South Africa's ruling ANC party has taken the early lead in the country's general election that is expected to make its leader, Jacob Zuma, president.
With about 300,000 ballots out of a potential 23 million counted from Wednesday's elections, the African National Congress had just over 53 per cent of the vote.
The main opposition Democratic Alliance trailed with nearly 28 per cent while the new Congress of the People (COPE), formed late last year by an ANC splinter group loyal to Thabo Mbeki, the former president, had around seven per cent in the early count.
Official final results are expected on Saturday.
High turnout
The voter turnout was estimated at 80 per cent – the highest since South Africa's first multiracial election 15 years ago.
Queues snaked outside polling stations across the country from before dawn until past dusk on Wednesday.
The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) admitted that there was a shortage of ballots for voters in several areas and many centres had to allow people to vote beyond the 9pm (19:00 GMT) cut-off.
"The response is absolutely overwhelming all over the country," Brigalia Bam, the IEC chairwoman, said.
Al Jazeera's Jane Dutton, reporting earlier from a polling station in Johannesburg, said that officials had resorted to using egg crates after they ran out of ballot boxes.
Many analysts believe the ANC, whose anti-apartheid credentials make it the choice for millions of black voters, will win the elections.
But many voters are also frustrated about corruption, poverty and crime and that, they believe, might cause the party's majority to drop from the nearly 70 per cent it achieved in 2004, to below the two-thirds mark that gives it the right to change the constitution at will.
Al Jazeera's Haru Mutasa, reporting from Cape Town, said many people had voiced support for opposition parties after becoming disillusioned with the ANC for taking too long to deliver on promises.
Margaret Nkoane, 57, said in Soweto, a Johannesburg township that symbolised the anti-apartheid struggle, said she "voted for the ANC out of loyalty because my father was active in the struggle".
"But I'm not satisfied with what they've done. People expected jobs but they are still living in shacks."
Still, the ANC is expected to capture enough votes for Zuma, 67, to become president.
If he does win, the son of a housekeeper who spent a decade jailed alongside Nelson Mandela, the country's democracy icon and first black president, would take charge as Africa's biggest economy teeters on the brink of its first recession in 17 years.
Source: Al Jazeera and agencies
ANC poised to win in SAfrica poll
by Fran Blandy
PRETORIA, (AFP) – South Africans voted massively into the early hours of Thursday in general polls all but certain to launch the ruling ANC party's popular but controversial leader Jacob Zuma into the presidency.
Polls began closing at 9:00 pm (1900 GMT), but the electoral commission said that voters waiting in line would be allowed to cast their ballot, and some were still open after midnight as results began to trickle in.
A crushing African National Congress (ANC) victory is all but certain, despite corruption allegations lingering over its leader and a challenge from the Congress of the People splinter party set up by supporters of his rival, ex-president Thabo Mbeki.
With less than 10 percent of the votes counted by 0200 GMT, the ANC was hovering around the 60 percent mark, followed by the main opposition Democratic Alliance who was already faring well in its stronghold of the Western Cape.
From before dawn, queues of voters -- some carrying chairs, wrapped in blankets and with mugs of coffee -- wound around polling stations with a record 23 million South Africans registered to cast ballots.
Turnout was so heavy in some areas that the election commission reported shortages of ballot papers and overflowing boxes at the busiest polling stations and initial results, while sparse, showed turnout of over 70 percent nationally.
The national icon of democracy Nelson Mandela cast his ballot in front of ululating crowds and a heavy media presence 15 years after his election as South Africa's first black president.
"The response is absolutely overwhelming all over the country," said Independent Electoral Commission chairwoman Brigalia Bam.
Despite an otherwise peaceful poll, a Congress of the People (COPE) official in the Eastern Cape was shot dead by three armed men in an attack on his home.
The final official tally is expected within one week.
The 67-year-old Zuma voted in his rural home village of Nkandla in KwaZulu-Natal province to rapturous cheers.
"When I grew up, I did not know that this day would come," he said.
"This makes me feel great and it's a feeling far different from the one that we had under the apartheid government" -- which denied blacks the right to vote.
Corruption charges were dropped against the ANC leader just two weeks ago but the case has done little to dent the party's popularity.
"Rome was never built in a day," said supermarket worker Maggie Kotso, 47, adding the ANC state had done more in 15 years than the apartheid regime had achieved in 48 years.
"Before, we could not have stood like that in the street. The police would come and beat us. Before, there were no toilets but buckets, no roads but mud," Kotso told AFP.
"Everything has not been done well so far but we still have hope and by supporting them, they will."
Despite the gains since apartheid, public frustrations are growing with 40 percent of the workforce unemployed, a staggering crime rate, and a limping health system burdened by the world's largest caseload of people with AIDS.
Zuma has campaigned on a pro-poor ticket with promises of improved public services, but will enter office as South Africa slides toward recession.
The son of a housekeeper, he was a stalwart of the struggle against white minority rule, and spent a decade jailed alongside Mandela on Robben Island.
After the first democratic elections in 1994, he rose through the party ranks to become the deputy to former president Mbeki. But the two developed a fierce rivalry, and Mbeki sacked him in 2005.
Boosted by support from the rural poor, Zuma seized the leadership of the ANC away from Mbeki in 2007. Under his stewardship, the party took less than a year to sack Mbeki as president.
Mbeki loyalists broke away from the party to form the new COPE which is tipped to win around 10 percent of the vote as is the Democratic Alliance.
Corruption claims that have dogged Zuma for years remain a headache. When prosecutors dropped the case, they said political meddling had soiled the legal process, although they remained confident they could convict him.
But for the 43 percent of South Africa's 48 million people living on less than two dollars a day, many see themselves in the rise of a self-educated former herdboy.
Election observers applaud SA standards
MANDY ROSSOUW
PRETORIA, SOUTH AFRICA
Apr 22 2009 20:18
South Africa sets an exemplary standard for elections, observers to the elections told the Mail & Guardian Online on Wednesday evening.
Only observers from African countries are in South Africa to monitor the national elections.
Observers from the African Union, Pan African Parliament (PAP), Southern African Development Community (SADC) as well as from Nigeria and Zimbabwe came to see whether the elections are free and fair.
"We are not here for an investigation, rather to show support for the process," Dr Salim Ahmed Salim, who heads the AU observer team said.
"There is no reason for concern here. There are strong institutions and great tolerance despite the past. The state of reconciliation that Madiba started in this country ensured this."
Salim pointed to xenophobic attacks last year as the only significant blot on the country's reconciliation track record.
"There is also so much enthusiasm by young people. It is an example to other countries on the continent," he said.
European countries accredited their diplomats based in Pretoria to act as observers, but the European Union did not send an observer team.
"The IEC has a good reputation and a positive track record to monitor elections. In other places there would be a lack of capacity to draft the lists and print ballot papers. We would only consider sending teams if there was a potential for violence or a threat to the stability of the country," a European diplomat told the M&G Online.
According to IEC chairperson Brigalia Bam South Africa has decided to allow observers for the elections but not election monitors.
The difference is that the monitors are able to intervene if there are problems at voting stations while observers may only report on problems after it took place, said Bam said.
Source: Mail & Guardian Online
Web Address: http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-04-22-election-observers-applaud-sa-standards
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