By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) will utilise its election night prediction model for the 2024 national and provincial elections.
South Africans will go to the polls on 29 May, to elect the political party to lead the country in the seventh administration. The 2024 general election has been described as the most contested election in the last 30 years.
In a statement, the CSIR says its prediction model relies on two core principles: the analysis of voter behaviour patterns and the sequence in which voting results are announced on election day.
“When combined, these two principles enable the team to group voters or voting districts based on their past voting behaviour, utilising a statistical clustering method.
“When applied in previous elections, the model typically achieved a high degree of accuracy at a national level once approximately 5% of the results had been tallied.”
The CSIR explained that the predictions become more stable and accurate as more voting districts are counted and once all voting districts have been declared.
CSIR Chief Executive Officer, Dr Thulani Dlamini, clarified that the model was not a polling system, but a model that uses statistical and mathematical analysis to predict election outcomes.
“It showcases how statistical clustering and some mathematical algorithms can achieve good predictions from a small sample of results. The election prediction model operates based on reducing the bias resulting from the ‘non-randomness’ of the incoming results that arise from the order in which the results are received, “he added.
The predictive modelling capabilities also allow this to be tailor-made for other predictive analysis work.
As one of its kind in the continent, CSIR has the capability of assisting other countries that may require such a tool to support election transparency and engagement.
“The organisation possesses robust capabilities in mathematics and statistics, which are applied to deliver precise results and can be customised for various forms of predictive analysis and forecasting,” he added.
The CSIR, an entity of the Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, is one of the leading scientific and technology research, development and implementation organisations in Africa.
The CSIR undertakes directed and multidisciplinary research and technological innovation, as well as industrial and scientific development, to improve the quality of life of all South Africans.