Nokukhanya Mntambo and Thabiso Goba30 May 2024 | 19:19

Election 2024 results: ANC takes an early lead

While the counting of the votes has been slow, with only about 30% of the voting districts counted so far, the IEC believes it's making headway.

Election 2024 results: ANC takes an early lead

The national results centre of the IEC at Gallagher Estate, Midrand, on 30 May 2024. Picture: GCIS

JOHANNESBURG – The African National Congress (ANC) has breached the 1.7 million mark on the leaderboard at the results operation centre as the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) tallies the votes for the general elections.

While the counting of the votes has been slow, the IEC believes it's making headway.

Only about 30% of the voting districts have been counted so far.

But the ANC has taken an early lead.

The governing party is followed by the Democratic Alliance (DA), which is also above the one million mark for supporters, as well as the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF).

The uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party has also been on the rise, often being neck and neck with the EFF.

The MK Party, led by Former President Jacob Zuma, has done especially well in KZN, even getting ahead of the ANC and the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) in that province.

But political experts believe this still could change, with the eThekwini Municipality expected to boost the ANC’s numbers in KZN.

Another political party that has drawn some attention is Gayton McKenzie’s Patriotic Alliance (PA).

Counting is expected to continue over the next few days.

MORE THAN HALF COUNTED

As of 8pm on Thursday, the commission said it had recorded 55.65% of the votes.

During a media briefing earlier on Thursday evening at the national results operations centre in Midrand, IEC General Manager Granville Abrahams said the full results had not been reflected on its platforms yet as the commission was still ensuring their accuracy.

"To achieve accuracy we have various processes, the first one being the capturing of the results slip as received after being checked, the scanning of the same results slip as an image matched to that capture, and the auditing thereof. Those processes, with the lags in between them, give rise to the fact that we have 33.45% of the results reflected on the board."