Voters queue at Schweizer-Reneke polling station as local government election day gets under way

Voters in Ipelegeng, Schweizer-Reneke, were at Mmathari Early Learning Centre in Ward 4 on Wednesday, casting their ballots in the 2026 Local Government Election, according to the Government of South Africa’s official X account.

The account posted four photographs from the polling station and urged South Africans to follow them to the ballot box. “Ink on the thumb, Voters in Ipelegeng, Schweizer-Reneke are showing up at Mmathari Early Learning Centre, Ward 4, and exercising their democratic right in the 2026 Local Government Election,” the post read.

It closed with a direct appeal to those who had not yet voted: “Have you made your mark yet?” The post carried the hashtags #MakeYourMarkCount, #YourVoteMatters and #GovZAUpdates.

The post is the government’s own account of turnout at one polling station on election day. It does not give a figure for the number of voters who had passed through Mmathari Early Learning Centre, and it does not report turnout for Schweizer-Reneke or for the municipality as a whole.

Municipal elections decide the councils that run local services, from water and refuse collection to electricity reticulation and local planning. In Schweizer-Reneke, in the North West, those decisions sit with the local municipality that voters in Ward 4 were choosing on Wednesday.