Central SA
Barkly West protesters halt voter registration─── PULANE CHOANE 11:19 Sun, 27 Jan 2019
The community of Barkly West, 35 kilometres from Kimberley in the Northern Cape, would not let the Electoral Commission of South Africa's (IEC) teams into its area unless the Dikgatlong Local Municipality addresses the service delivery issues.
This is according to the IEC's Electoral Manager in the province, Bonolo Modise, who says that the town was the only one in the province where IEC teams were unable to register voters ahead of the 2019 elections.
“It became extremely difficult for us to continue with our operations at that specific station. What we tried to do was to intervene through our conflict mediation processes, where we went in and met with the community leaders... but unfortunately, the community was adamant that without their issues being addressed by the municipality, there was no way they'd allow registrations to continue.
“We also enlisted the services of the police to see if there was no way that registrations could continue while other issues were being addressed on the other side," Modise said.
OFM News was unable to reach police in the area for comment on whether or not any arrests were made.
Despite being unable to register residents from the troubled town, Modise said that proceedings had gone fairly well at other voting stations across the province.
He also added that the IEC was expecting a larger turnout on Sunday as it would be the last day for voter registrations.
IEC NC manager, Bonolo Modise:
