IEC official accused of illegally transporting ballots acquitted

The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) banner outside a voting station at Hofland Park Community Centre in Johannesburg on May 29, 2025.

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The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) official accused of illegally transporting voting materials without a police escort during last year’s general elections has been acquitted by the Pietermaritzburg Magistrates Court.

uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP) members laid a criminal charge against Nkosinathi Mnikathi, who was an IEC area manager in the Imbali area.

Handing down his judgment, Magistrate, Edmund Szudrawski said that based on the evidence presented by the commission’s Provincial Manager, Ntombifuthi Masinga and other witnesses had the right to transport IEC material without a police escort.

Attending the judgement, IEC CEO, Sy Mamabolo says, “I think this is a dark spot on our electoral democratic experience because we should not be here in the first place. Area managers have within their scope of responsibility of the removal of the material. We really didn’t need not be here in the first place.”

“I think that they should have listened to the event organisers who appointed these officers and who have given them the material, because otherwise, absent the ability to move the material, the electoral process will collapse at certain voting stations.”

MKP Provincial Deputy Co-ordinator, Shirley Willemse, says they will communicate with their legal team and chart the way forward.

Willemse says, “We do have a case and we will have communication with our legal team, although we know that the courts are biased and this is and this is one of the battles where we continue showing South Africans that there is something (wrong) with the judiciary.”

“The Roman and Dutch law does not have to rule this country, that is why our president says ‘we need the majority to change the Dutch and Roman system because of such cases’.”