Multi-Party Coalition in Tshwane taking urgent legal advice on IEC decision to invalidate ballots Speaker election

14 March 2023

The Multi-Party Coalition has lodged a formal objection to the outcome of the election of speaker of the Tshwane municipal council, after the IEC classified 69 ballots cast for Kholofelo Morodi (ActionSA) as ‘spoilt’.

During the counting process the DA, ActionSA and FF Plus party agents pointed to the fact that the 69 ballots clearly indicated the intention of voters. There was no confusion or ambiguity in the markings. Neither were any ballots defaced.

The IEC classified the 69 votes as ‘spoilt’ based on the fact that they were marked not with a crosses but with numbers. Yet in the IEC’s own literature, one of the examples of a valid vote is one where the intention of the voter is indicated by the marking of a number. 

Had the 69 so-called ‘spoilt’ ballots not been discarded, the total result for Councillor Morodi would’ve been 106 of the 211 ballots cast.

We believe that IEC officials were under pressure by the ANC and the EFF to discard these ballots in order to ensure the election of their preferred speaker candidate. Telling about the decision of the IEC to exclude these ballots is the fact that every one of these 69 ballots were cast for Councillor Morodi whom the Multi-Party Coalition majority endorsed as candidate for Speaker.

A previous round for voting had to be abandoned after ANC and EFF councillors stormed the voting area, grabbed a ballot box and even took a ballot from a DA councillor.

The Multi-Party Coalition will be consulting attorneys today to determine what remedy is available to us to ensure that the 69 ballots cast for Councillor Morodi are duly counted.

Issued by Tshwane Multi-party Coalition, 14 March 2023