Ongoing

  1. ElectionsHot
  2. AIHot
  3. US mid-termsHeating up
Newsbrief

IEC receives more than 800 complaints after election

Published

Ongoing: Elections Hot

Most complaints to the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) concern staff who did not let party observers watch voting and counting. Deputy chief electoral officer Masego Sheburi said about 106 complaints remained open.

Sheburi said the IEC will release the results once all material objections are in. He said the law bars the commission from declaring results before the deadline for those objections.

Chief electoral officer Sy Mamabolo addressed concerns about party agents who did not countersign result slips. He said this does not invalidate the official results.

Preliminary counts show 15.9 million South Africans took part in special and election day voting. The law gives the IEC seven days to declare final results.

Key facts

Who
Masego Sheburi (Deputy chief electoral officer, Electoral Commission of South Africa); Sy Mamabolo (Chief electoral officer, Electoral Commission of South Africa); Electoral Commission of South Africa (Election body that received the complaints)
What
By late Wednesday, the IEC had received over 800 election complaints, most about staff not letting parties observe voting and counting. Deputy chief electoral officer Masego Sheburi said about 106 remained open, and the IEC will release results once all material objections are in.
When
4 November 2026
Where
South Africa
Status
Reported

Elections Hot

What you need to know

The CSIR projects the ANC at around 31.7% and the DA at 25.8% nationally, with the MKP at around 9%, based on 13% of voting districts declared. The Electoral Commission said results are coming in faster than in 2021, with 18 municipalities finished by 9am on Thursday against 7 at that point then.

The commission is handling more than 800 party complaints, about 106 still open, and cannot declare final results before 5pm on Friday. Earlier, the ANC won the first declared council, Renosterberg in the Northern Cape, after about 12 million people voted on Wednesday, with turnout near 44% by 5pm.

Problems on the day included queues of up to six hours in Cape Metro, and ballot boxes set aside at two Matsulu voting stations after tampering claims.

  1. ANC loses outright majority in Makana council
  2. MK Party leads early KwaZulu-Natal count as ANC accepts outcome
  3. KwaZulu-Natal turnout of 48.7% beats national average in elections

See every update

AI Hot

What you need to know

Nvidia has told its cloud computing clients to sell at least 51% of their services to non-Chinese companies, according to five people with knowledge of the matter. Anthropic said it has committed to spend close to $900bn on AI infrastructure, and that its computing costs are rising faster than its revenues.

Elsewhere, reports from unnamed sources say OpenAI's latest funding round is falling short of expectations, and a judge let the NAACP pollution case against xAI proceed. In South Africa, the VAST AI investment scheme went offline on 30 October after withdrawals marked approved did not arrive, according to a news investigation.

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US mid-terms Heating up

What you need to know

President Donald Trump said on 5 November that the Iran war was needed to stop Tehran getting a nuclear weapon, and he admitted it contributed to Republican losses. Democrats won back both the US House and Senate in the 3 November midterm elections, according to media projections, as exit polls showed voters angry about high prices.

The Senate majority came after upsets in Texas and Kansas, with James Talarico projected to beat Republican Ken Paxton. Iranian officials said US voters had rejected the war, while Tehran stayed on high alert for possible new US strikes.

Markets reacted, with the dollar falling to a one-month low and the rand firming to around R16.55, and Scope Ratings said it kept its AA rating on the US.

  1. Democrats win US midterms and vow to check Trump
  2. Trump says Iran war was worth it despite election losses
  3. Scope Ratings calls Democratic midterm sweep positive for US credit

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