PRETORIA, South Africa, Sept. 2– More than 140,000 candidates have submitted their nominations to contest South Africa’s upcoming local government elections, up about 43 percent from the previous elections in 2021, the country’s Electoral Commission (IEC) said Wednesday.
A total of 142,072 candidates were nominated to contest 10,526 council seats across municipalities by the nomination deadline of Aug. 28, IEC Chairperson Mosotho Moepya told a media briefing in Pretoria. South Africa is scheduled to hold its local government elections on Nov. 4.
“The immediate task of the Electoral Commission now is to review the submissions for compliance with the legislative requirements governing candidate nominations. This includes, among others, checking whether candidates had completed acceptance of nomination forms; political parties and independent candidates had paid the applicable deposits; and independent candidates had submitted the details of registered voters supporting their candidature,” said Moepya.
The final list of candidates will be released on Sept. 16, according to the IEC. Of the nominations received, political parties nominated 40,241 candidates to contest proportional representation seats and 100,856 to contest ward seats, while 975 independent candidates were nominated to run in ward contests.
Competition is particularly intense in the country’s major metropolitan areas. Johannesburg has the largest number of parties contesting proportional representation seats at 80, followed by Tshwane with 72, eThekwini with 70, Ekurhuleni with 69 and Cape Town with 55.
The IEC called on all nominated candidates to comply with the Electoral Code of Conduct, saying it remained committed to delivering “free, fair and credible” elections. (Namibia Daily News / Xinhua)
