Election rivalry takes heavy toll on posters
● How does a giant billboard disappear in the middle of the night? That’s the question Jacob Zuma’s newly formed MK Party hopes the police will answer after one of its electoral signs was removed from the northern KwaZulu-Natal town of Dundee on March
24.
As the countdown to the highly contested May elections hots up, a poster war has already broken out, with allegations of sabotage and foul play coming thick and fast.
The MK Party said the billboard was not the party’s only election resource to have been targeted, as posters featuring Zuma’s face had also been removed and damaged on the Bluff, south of Durban.
Noma Buthelezi, the MK Party Youth League’s spokesperson, attributed the incidents to “cowardice and hooliganism”, and said the party had reported the matter to the police and the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC).
“Those responsible should be apprehended and face legal consequences. Such behaviour is unacceptable. The responsibility for addressing these incidents lies with law enforcement agencies.”
Buthelezi said the vandalism hit the MK Party in the pocket because it did not have funding from the country’s billionaires.
ActionSA laid a charge with the police on March 13 after its election posters were removed and “replaced by IFP posters” in the vicinity of Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban.
The party’s provincial chairperson, Zwakele Mncwango, urged the city to release CCTV footage that could show who was responsible.
Mncwango told the Sunday Times his party had also experienced the removal of posters in Nongoma, in northern KwaZuluNatal.
“We are committed to peaceful elections, but the poster-removal issue shows political intolerance and also [damages] our democracy … Individuals should not be allowed to ‘decampaign’ other parties. When that happens, you can’t then say there are free and fair elections,” said Mncwango.
ActionSA has also seen its posters removed and vandalised in Mbombela, Mpumalanga. The party said destroying, removing or defacing the posters was a criminal offence that could result in a fine or a period of imprisonment of up to 10 years.
DA national spokesperson Solly Malatsi said a number of the party’s posters had been removed or damaged in various parts of the country. He said in one case DA members had photographed a team from a rival party removing DA posters while erecting their own banners.
“The Electoral Act must be strictly implemented. There should be a proper and swift investigation, and prosecutions and convictions must take place,” said Malatsi.
In the Western Cape, Masizole Mnqasela, leader of the Alliance of Citizens for Change, said his party’s posters had been vandalised and removed since February.
“We will not tolerate this nonsense. We hope the police will investigate this crime and the IEC will work with all parties to ensure they enforce the code of conduct,” said Mnqasela.
But ANC KwaZulu-Natal spokesperson Mafika Mndebele said the party appeared to have been spared poster vandalism. If posters were damaged or removed, it happened in isolated areas.
The EFF in KwaZulu-Natal said a number of its posters were removed in Mtubatuba, in the northern part of the province. EFF secretary-general Marshall Dlamini urged political leaders to be responsible and call upon their members to refrain from damaging the posters of rival parties.
University of KwaZulu-Natal political analyst Fikile Vilakazi said the issue of posters was an important one.
“Political parties don’t [all] have the same financial muscle when it comes to campaigns, because they are expensive. So removing posters affects the message they want to send to voters. This happens in any election, but this election is a bit more sensitive.
“The language of war has entered the political conversation. We are going to have a coalition, and a lot of people want to be kingmakers, while others are still hoping they can get a majority vote, which is not possible,” Vilakazi said.
The IEC did not respond to queries.