ANC IN RACE AGAINST TIME TO NOMINATE CANDICATES

By Emily Setona

QWAQWA –The ANC branches in Thabo Mofutsanayana region went ahead with the nomination of candidates in anticipation of the Constitutional Court’s ruling on the Independent Electoral Commission’s (IEC) application for the postponement of the October 27 local government elections.

The Constitutional Court, on Friday last week, reserved judgement on the IEC’s application for postponement of the polls to February 2022.

Aspiring ANC councillors for Maluti–a–Phofung’s Ward 28 gathered at Letotolo Primary School in a bid to persuade community members to vote for them.

Local radio station QwaQwa Radio and various social media platforms were used to inform residents of Ward 28 that at 12:00pm on Thursday August 19 2021, community members had to make their way to Letotolo to vote for their preferred ANC candidates for the position of Ward 28 councillor.

The residents of Ward 28 did show up at the event but were undone by the timing as many more people were still at work. This prompted the two candidates, K. Twala and M. Mahlasinyana to requested that the community meeting be postponed to Saturday 21 August.

A large portion of the community members in attendance were in support of the re-election of Councillor Mary Crockett, better known as Pastor Mary.

Eminent residents of Ward 28 stated categorically that they don’t want to vote for someone they don’t know. They said Pastor Mary had availed vehicles to collect senior citizens to support her campaign and therefore they were more than happy to throw their weight behind support her re-election.

The other candidates were evidently isolated and did not find favour with most of the community members there.

Some of the residents admitted to having been bought free alcohol and given money to come and vote for Pastor Mary. This led to the other candidates lodging a complaint at the regional of ANC.

However, Pastor Mary refuted the claims and insisted she did not use any underhanded tactics to get residents to support her campaign.he other candidates do not want to participate in the voting process; they want to postpone it to Saturday. Unfortunately, today is the final day for submission of names,” said councillor Crockett.

Later in the day, a final nomination form was handed in at the ANC’s regional office with the names of different candidates to those present at the community meeting and a record of 4300 registered voters, which saw 625 votes in favour of Pastor Mary.

In Bolata Ward 13, another ANC  candidate Mokoinihi Malemoha garnered 500 votes out of 700 , the remaining 200 was shared among his three  opponents during a meeting held at Bolata tribal office.

So far there are 97 political parties and over 353 independent candidates submitted to  IEC to contest local government elections. Political parties and independent candidates have until 21 hours  on Monday to submit their candidates lists and prescribed election deposits.