ANC Limpopo dismisses ward candidate row as IEC says ward residency is not required

The African National Congress in Limpopo has dismissed complaints from some of its own members in Ga-Sekgopo and Luthuli Park about the ward councillor candidates on the party’s list, as SABC News reported on 22 September.

The dispute centres on Ward 10 in Ga-Sekgopo, in Limpopo’s Mopani district, and Ward 14 in Polokwane. Members in both wards say the candidates were not nominated by the community. They also say the candidates do not live in the wards they would represent.

According to the SABC, the party in the province has rejected those objections. The Electoral Commission of South Africa, which runs the country’s elections, says a prospective candidate registered under the same municipality can contest any ward within that municipality’s borders.

That position matters because it goes to the heart of what ward representation is meant to be. A ward councillor sits in a specific ward, and the residents there are the people who live with the consequences of the council’s decisions on water, electricity, refuse, roads and planning. Ward 14 in Polokwane is an urban ward in the province’s capital. Ward 10 in Ga-Sekgopo falls under the Greater Tzaneen municipal area in Mopani, a largely rural stretch of Limpopo where many residents depend on agriculture and on grants.

Residency is not the only test the law sets. The IEC’s requirement that a candidate be registered under the same municipality, rather than the same ward, is a long-standing rule. It means a candidate can be fielded in a ward they do not live in, as long as their registration and the party’s list meet the municipal boundary requirement. That rule applies to every party, not only to the ANC.

What the SABC report does not settle is how the party chose these particular candidates, or what internal process the dissenting members followed before going public. The report says the ANC in Limpopo has dismissed the disputes. It does not say who in the province said so, or whether the complaints were taken through the party’s own structures first.

For voters in the two wards, the practical question is narrower than the argument. On election day, the name on the ballot is the candidate, not the process that put them there. A resident who feels the candidate was imposed from outside still has to decide whether to vote for the party, for another party, or not at all.

Ward candidate disputes are not unusual in the run-up to a local government election, and they are not unique to Limpopo or to the ANC. Parties across the spectrum have faced complaints from branch members that their preferred candidates were overlooked. The IEC’s role is to administer the registration and nomination process, not to adjudicate internal party democracy.

SABC News reported the story first. Its account is the basis for the facts above. What this piece adds is the context around the IEC’s municipal registration rule and what the dispute means for the two wards involved.

Source: SABC News, ANC Limpopo | Ga-Sekgopo, Luthuli Park ward candidate row over party list.