By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) councillors could have transgressed IEC voting guidelines when they numbered their ballots amid the row over the election of a council speaker in Tshwane.
The party had instructed its councillors to mark ballots with allocated numbers, instead of a cross, to indicate which candidate they backed.
DA councillor Cilliers Brink said the party took a strategic decision to mark ballots by indicating who councillors voted for.
The ballots were marked with numbers designated to each DA councillor ahead of the voting process.
Brink said the DA believed the IEC should have allowed the votes. He denied that the DA used the strategy because it did not trust its coalition partners.
DA are mulling whether to legally challenge the Tshwane Speaker election process, in which 69 ballots were disqualified.
Ballots by DA councillors were marked incorrectly, leading to it being declared as spoilt ballots and paving the way for the African Transformation Movement’s Mncedi Ndzwanana to be elected as speaker.
The voting process was held by way of secret ballot.
Former deputy chairperson of the Independent Electoral Commission Terry Tselane says the Tshwane municipal manager was well within his rights to decline ballots where he felt the secrecy of a vote was compromised.
Tselane said if a voter’s intentions are unclear it will be counted as a spoilt ballot.
“A spoilt ballot is one where you cannot make out how a voter wanted to vote, and it is where a vote is compromised. If the secrecy of a voter is compromised by the vote, that is a spoilt ballot.”
Tselane added that a political party can instruct members to follow certain guideline as long as it’s not in violation of the rules of the vote.
“Any person who feels unsatisfied by the decisions of the election officials has the right to approach the appropriate courts. If there is a clear indication that the secrecy of a vote was compromised, then the municipal manager and the council would be protected by the legislation for rejecting such a ballot.
The City of Tshwane said the City manager, Johann Mettler, had to accept the result.
The ANC, EFF and a group of smaller political parties in the Tshwane council, including the PAC and the Patriotic Alliance, backed Ndzwanana.
This bloc does not hold a council majority.
The DA and its coalition partners, ActionSA, ACDP, IFP and FF-Plus, hold a majority.