The Independent Electoral Commission’s (IEC) readiness for the municipal elections was called into question when the Electoral Court instructed it to postpone by-elections in Tlokwe, North West, due to problems with addresses on the voters’ roll. The IEC then postponed by-elections around the country, suggesting the problems might be more extensive. The Electoral Court decision came months after the Constitutional Court last year also found problems with the voters’ roll in the area.[1]
Several irate South Africans have since taken to social media to complain about the fact that after living at the same address for over 20 years, they are suddenly receiving an SMS from the IEC informing them that the IEC does not have their address.
Lance Mitchell DFS, @sempir (2016, 11 April): “How could my home address change from one election to the next if I haven’t moved for the last 10 years? #IEC.”
René, @runawayrene (2016, 12 April): “Registered at voting station at Umhlanga. Not asked for proof of address. How can IEC be sure I am legitimate?”
Magasela, @NtokozoMagasela (2016, 13 April): “Registered #IEC I’ve always been a voter based in Diepkloof but as to how my address ended up being in Zola I have no idea!”
The IEC has been sending the text messages in an effort to get voters to register their addresses ahead of the 3 August 2016 Municipal Elections.The messages are being sent to 5.3 million (whose cellphone numbers the IEC has sourced) of the 6.92 million voters for whom the IEC says they do not have addresses. Efforts to reach the remaining 1.6 million voters include radio adverts and other media.
The IEC cited the recent Constitutional Court ruling and said they have “undertaken a review of addresses on the voters’ roll” and discovered “a large number of addresses are missing or incomplete” for the 25 million registered voters.
Leanne Manas, @LeanneManas (2016, 11 April): “The IEC say close to 16 Million physical Addresses still need to be verified. SMS your ID number to 32810 to ensure your details are updated”
They said reasons for this could include errors made in capturing the details of the original application forms, and urged South Africans to fill in a REC1 form to update their address details.[2]
Elections free and fair?
The ability of the IEC to hold credible, free and fair elections has been questioned in recent months after a Constitutional Court ruling last year that set aside the results of Tlokwe by-elections in the North West due to irregularities.
The court ordered the IEC to conduct fresh by-elections. It further instructed the IEC to verify physical addresses of those on the voters’ roll for future elections.[3] The verification of addresses where voters were registered was the biggest challenge for the IEC. Since it is illegal for people to register in a voting district where they do not reside, registration officials have to confirm that voters are registered in the correct voting district.
IEC aims to work with municipalities, the Department of Home Affairs and the South African Social Security Agency and is also approaching companies that have access to customer details for assistance in verifying addresses.[4]
According to IEC deputy chairperson Terry Tselane there are a lot of areas with no addresses in this country. The biggest challenge will be to go into each and every area, identify landmarks and then identify them on the map.[5]
Urgency in making use of proper addressing technology
South Africans living in areas which do not have formal addresses are said be given an identifier soon, linked to the head of households, that will be able to be located on the internet as well as Global Positioning Systems (GPS) and be considered as an address. According to Vusi Madonsela, the director-general of the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs “What became clear is that there is in fact a plethora of informal settlements that are not proclaimed as such which means the Deeds Offices does not know they exist.”
Mandonsela has reported that the Department has asked Stats SA and SAPO to assign unique identifiers, which is a unique number assigned to every dwelling unit and is given to the name of the head of the unit. This number is said to be used for purposes of this election and a whole range of other issues.
Mandonsela also added that the identifiers, which he called geo locators, would be used nationally because it was not only residents in informal settlements that did not have an address. People living in rural areas also did not have addresses.[6]
IDATA has been appointed service provider to SAPO since 2004, having built and maintained the Postal Delivery Database of over 21 million unique South African addresses and 36 million unique SA individuals as customers of SAPO, we are proud to say that we have been ensuring SA companies are contacting their customers at their correct addresses for almost 30 years.
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[1] http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2016-03-03-despite-registration-challenges-iec-insists-its-on-a-voters-roll/#.VxeNZNR95hs
[2] http://www.sapeople.com/2016/04/08/south-africans-react-to-voting-texts-from-iec/
[3] http://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/2016-local-elections-a-huge-test-for-the-iec-1971161
[4] http://www.bdlive.co.za/national/2016/03/14/iec-struggles-to-address-problem-of-verification
[5] http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2016-01-15-a-winters-poll-municipal-elections-2016/#.VxiYqNR95hs
[6] http://www.thenewage.co.za/iec-goes-high-tech-to-verify-a-voters-address/