Manual Wits SRC vote count after queries

WITS University has had to manually count the student representative council election ballot papers after allegations of election rigging were lodged.

The university held SRC elections last week and the results were to be announced on Monday. Instead, according to spokeswoman Shirona Patel, two of the contesting parties asked for a manual verification of the results.

The results were counted on an online system, and the outcome indicated that the Progressive Youth Alliance, which is aligned to the ANC, won all 15 SRC seats.

Patel said 32 percent of the more than 36 000 students voted, and she denied that any rigging had taken place.

“If anyone has any evidence of rigging, we will investigate it,” she said.

But EFF National Student Command (EFFSC) spokesman Peter Keetse was adamant the results were rigged.

“We know the ballot papers were left unattended over the weekend and something might have happened.”

But the EFFSC said they would not contest the results.

Keetse said the EFF had done well at the University of South Africa, and that gave them hope they would win at other institutions as well.

Preliminary Unisa results indicated the EFF grew support. They showed the EFFSC and SA Students Congress had won three seats each at the Pretoria main campus, the ANC Youth League two and DA one.

Unisa spokesman Martin Ramotshela said they would confirm results only once all the votes had been counted.