All voting stations opened on time even temporary structures: IEC KZN

The Electoral Commission (IEC) in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) says all voting stations, including temporary structures in the form of tents, opened on time for the weekend’s registration process, despite strong wind conditions on the North Coast.

Provincial Electoral Officer Ntombifuthi Masinga says the province has more than 5 000 voting stations of which 146 are tents.

“We are also happy to report that all tents that needed to be pitched in the 146 voting sites pitched on time. In the northern areas of KwaZulu- Natal, we couldn’t pitch them yesterday because of strong winds experienced, but our suppliers did us a favour and made sure that we have those tents pitched up in time for the voting stations to start operating at 8 this morning.”

Masinga adds that they’re pleased that KZN recorded the highest number of voter registration transactions in the country so far. She says by midday the province has had more than 60 000 transaction activities.

The electoral body had set itself a target of registering more than 300 000 new voters in the province based on Home Affairs data.

“Sixty-three thousand of them are in KZN and out of those just 8 500 are new registrations. We’re quite excited with this because it’s still quite early in the day to get all those young people that we need on the voters roll registered,” adds Masinga.