The DA says vote counting for the positions contested at its elective congress will only start on Sunday afternoon and then the announcement of the winners will be made. More than 2 000 delegates attending the party’s virtual federal congress have voted for the party’s fourth permanent leader.
DA interim leader John Steenhuisen and the party’s member of the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature Mbali Ntuli are competing for the position. Presiding officer at the conference, Greg Krumbock outlines the agenda for today ahead of the announcement.
“The votes have all now been taken in, they are stored very safely under lock and key in our federal head office safes and the key is with the auditor. This morning we will be kicking off with various reports and adopting our policy resolutions. And then at 1 o clock the counting will start, it will be a question of downloading the flash drive tallying up the votes and we will have a result for at around about 3.30.”
New DA leader to be announced on Sunday:
Voting for new leadership went well: Solly Malatsi
Democratic Alliance (DA) National Spokesperson Solly Malatsi says voting for a new leadership at its virtual elective conference went well although the deadline for voting had to be extended by an extra hour. This was due to a number of delegates experiencing COVID-19 symptoms at the hybrid venues as well as various other problems.
Briefing the media at the end of the first day of congress, Malatsi outlined the processes to follow.
“Now that voting for our leadership has concluded, all the voting data will be backed up on a flash disk in the presence of party agents and an independent auditor here at our nerve centre, at our offices. This flash disk plus a backup will be put in a special envelope which is sealed with a plastic tab marked with a serial code which breaks when it is opened so it will be safely stored in a safe the whole night. The results are scheduled to be announced at approximately 14:00 tomorrow after which the elected leader will deliver their acceptance speech.”
