IEC Election Update: Vote Counting Progress & Municipality Results

South Africa’s local government elections have entered the decisive counting phase, shifting public attention from neighbourhood polling booths to the national and provincial Results Operations Centres. With voting stations formally closing at 21:00 last night and late-queue ballots processed, the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) has spent the night auditing and tallying millions of ballots under close political scrutiny.

According to the Commission’s morning briefing, counting and verification operations continued uninterrupted across all nine provinces in full view of accredited domestic and international observers, party agents, and independent candidate representatives.

35% of results slips captured as 18 local councils conclude

The IEC’s results-processing pipeline is moving at a noticeably quicker clip compared to previous local government polls.

Key progress metrics recorded as of 09:00:

• Total expected results slips: 66,073 slips across 23,696 voting stations nationwide.
• Scanned slips: 23,444 slips (35.5%) successfully scanned into the central digital system.
• Captured data: 22,983 slips (34.8%) fully entered into the capture system.
• Independently audited: 16,791 slips (25.4%) audited and verified by independent auditing firms.
• Completed municipalities: Results from 18 local municipalities (representing 7% of all councils) have already been finalized.

By comparison, only seven local councils had been declared at the exact same juncture during the 2021 municipal elections, underscoring improved technological and operational efficiencies across counting venues.

Double-blind verification and the fight against disinformation

Addressing premature victory declarations on social media, the IEC emphasized that multiple statutory safeguards protect the integrity of every ballot before results are certified.

The standard verification pipeline requires:

1. Station reconciliation: Party agents countersign physical results slips at voting stations immediately after counting.
2. Double-blind data capture: Two independent operators capture slip data without seeing each other’s inputs to flag clerical discrepancies.
3. Independent audit review: Third-party auditors match physical scanned slips against digital portal records before releasing them to the leaderboard.
4. Automated anomaly detection: System algorithms flag impossible turnout numbers, statistical outliers, or arithmetic mismatches for immediate manual review.

The Commission issued a stern warning against speculative results and election disinformation, cautioning that unverified assertions risk inflaming political tensions and inciting violence.

Citizens and party leaders have been urged to rely solely on authenticated data feeds accessible via the official IEC website, the IEC mobile app, and the dedicated WhatsApp service (0600 88 0000) as the country prepares for final council allocations.