Johannesburg – All eyes are on whether the Independent Electoral Commission will extend the deadline for the registration of candidates for the local elections.
This is after Constitutional Court dismissed the commission’s bid to postpone the local polls from 27 October to February next year.
However, the country’s apex court also declared the proclamation for the date of the elections – 27 October – issued by Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma to be unconstitutional and invalid.
The court ordered that the polls take place anytime between 27 October and 1 November, the time by which the five-year term of the current councils will have elapsed.
The IEC must hold a weekend registration for eligible voters by no later than 10 September, after which Dlamini Zuma must proclaim a new election date, which should be before 1 November.
“The commission must, within three calendar days after the date of this order, determine whether it is practically possible to hold a voter registration weekend with a view to registering new voters and changing registered voters particulars on the national voters’ roll in time for local government elections to be held on any day in the period from Wednesday, 27 October 2021 to Monday, 1 November 2021 (both dates inclusive)” the court order reads.
“The commission must notify the Minister of, and publicly announce, its determination as soon as it has been made.
However, it was not immediately clear whether the proclamation of a new election date will see the IEC extending its deadline for registration of candidates.
On Tuesday, the ANC withdrew its court application from the Electoral Court seeking to force the IEC to postpone the deadline for the registration of candidates.
This is after the ruling party failed to register candidates in 93 municipalities, 35 of which the party won’t contest meaning the organisation was going to lose the councils without contesting for them.
The ruling party had argued in its papers to the Electoral Court that it needed a 36-hour extension to submit candidates where it failed to do so.
The Constitutional Court refusal to postpone the elections to February, as argued by the IEC, means political parties will have to conduct their campaigns within the Covid-19 regulations.
The EFF, which joined the IEC in court, wanted the polls to be postponed so as to allow for time to campaign. The ANC and IFP also supported calls for the postponement of the elections.
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