WATCH: IEC declares 2026 local elections free and fair despite ballot disputes

IEC says 2026 local elections were free and fair

The IEC has declared the 2026 Local Government Elections free and fair.

Chief Electoral Officer Sy Mamabolo defended the IEC’s management of the 2026 local government elections, while acknowledging operational shortcomings and the disruption caused by a Constitutional Court order affecting candidate lists.

Mamabolo said the commission had successfully delivered the elections through extensive operational planning, technological improvements and the deployment of thousands of election officials across the country.

Addressing the official conclusion of the elections at the IEC Results Operations Centre in Gauteng on Sunday evening, Mamabolo said the commission had a responsibility to account for the systems, resources and administrative processes that made the elections possible.

He said 15.2 million South Africans had participated in the elections, with approximately 188 000 electoral staff deployed across 23 696 voting stations countrywide.

Mamabolo said the commission had also strengthened its election management systems through the introduction of a Virtual Results Operations Centre, which allowed political parties and candidates to access selected election applications and results remotely.

A total of 1 149 users registered on the platform, including 85 political parties and 328 individual party officials.

The platform recorded 54 908 information requests. The commission also received 14.3 million requests for information through its application programming interface (API), which enabled media organisations, political parties, researchers and other stakeholders to access preliminary results as they were audited.

Despite the operational achievements, Mamabolo acknowledged that the commission had not got everything right.

“The 2026 local government elections were an unreserved endeavour to affirm the personhood of all voters. We have succeeded in many aspects in this election but we have come short in others,” he said.

The elections also presented logistical challenges, including a Constitutional Court order handed down on October 15, which necessitated changes to candidate lists and resulted in approximately 28 million ballot papers being superseded.

The order related to 181 ANC candidates in six municipalities, but the IEC extended the same dispensation to 32 other political parties in similar circumstances.

Mamabolo said the changes required additional production, quality assurance, packaging and distribution arrangements within an already established election timetable.

The commission printed just over 100 million ballot papers for the elections and deployed approximately 56 000 voter management devices to support voting station operations.

Mamabolo said the commission would continue assessing its performance, documenting lessons and identifying areas requiring improvement ahead of future elections.