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DA reiterates it will challenge IEC’s decision to amend election timetable

8 September 2021, 2:16 PM |

Fanele Mhlongo | @SABCNews

Waeeda Salie, casts her ballot at a polling station, during the South Africa's parliamentary and provincial elections, in Cape Town, South Africa, May 8, 2019.

Image: Reuters

Waeeda Salie, casts her ballot at a polling station, during the South Africa's parliamentary and provincial elections, in Cape Town, South Africa, May 8, 2019.

Democratic Alliance (DA) leader John Steenhuisen says the party will not allow the African National Congress (ANC) and the Independent Electoral Commission to manipulate rules to suit their agenda.

Steenhuisen shared these sentiments when the DA flighted its local government elections posters in Durban.

The DA has urgently applied to the Constitutional Court to nullify the IEC’s decision to reopen the registration process for ward councillor candidates for next month’s elections.

Some political parties have also criticised the IEC’s decision to amend the election timetable, allowing the ANC and other parties to register candidates. P

Political parties react to IEC’s election timetable:

The ANC had missed the August deadline to register candidates in 93 municipalities.

“The presence of our posters here will also serve as a daily reminder that the DA is the only significant party willing and ready to contest these elections. While the ANC and others have been desperately trying to get the elections postponed because of their internal warfare and scrambling finances have left them in no position to launch a campaign of any sort. We have also noted down the Constitutional Court judgment intended for the election to take place in seven weeks’ time without banding rules for the ANC candidate submissions. The disastrous preparations and missed deadlines deserve no different treatment to that of the IFP in 2011 and the NFP in 2016,” says Steenhuisen.

On the 25th of September, we officially launch our election manifesto. This is an opportunity for all South Africans to get to understand our offer in this election, and what we can bring to their town or city in government. – @jsteenhuisen #VoteDA

— Democratic Alliance (@Our_DA) September 8, 2021

ANC’s plans regarding the IEC timetable

Meanwhile, ANC members have until 11 September to sort out any problems around candidate nomination lists. That is according to the party’s Deputy Secretary-General, Jessie Duarte.

ANC briefs the media on local government elections: