Nelson Mandela Bay leads charge as election fever builds

An impressive 601,715 people are registered to vote in Nelson Mandela Bay for the May 29 national and provincial elections, with the majority being women.

A total of 32,653 new voters in the metro have been added to the voters’ roll.

The figures ensure the Bay remains the region with the highest number of registered voters in the province, comprising 17.5% of the total of 3.43-million people registered.

In the 2021 local government elections, 583,270 people in the Bay were registered to vote and the turnout was 46.07%, narrowly surpassing Buffalo City Metro (BCM), which recorded 45.64%.

The total turnout in the province was 46.81%.

Though the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) expects the registrations to translate into a high turnout later in May, a political analyst says several factors will determine the mood of voters on the day.

In the Bay, women account for 336,665 of registered voters, considerably more than the 265,050 men registered.

The highest number of registrations was recorded in ward 1 (13,789), ward 60 (13,444) and ward 40 (12,942).

Ward 1 includes the Summerstrand, Sardinia Bay and Seaview areas, ward 60 encompasses areas such as Wells Estate, Coega and Bluewater Bay, while ward 40 includes Kuyga, Kragga Kamma and Lakeside.

Prospective voters between the ages of 40 to 49 make up the biggest cohort, with 131,930 registering.

IEC provincial spokesperson Sanda Nodada said the commission expects a higher number of people to vote compared with previous polls.

“We already have more than 200,000 applications for special votes.

“We are expecting a high number of voters in the upcoming elections, given the interventions and voter education that has been conducted across the province.”

In the Bay, 57,191 people applied for special votes.

The Eastern Cape has the third-highest percentage of registered voters at 12.4%, trailing Gauteng at 23.6% and KwaZulu-Natal (20.7%).

Political analyst Oscar van Heerden said the record registration numbers did not automatically correlate with an increase in actual votes cast on election day.

“Inclement weather is the biggest factor that keeps people from voting,” he said.

“People either choose to sleep in, they do not want to be in the rain or wind, and so on.”

Van Heerden said the voter turnout was also affected by the visibility of political parties.

“Those that do [go to the polling stations] are also affected by which political parties took the effort to go to their ward and rural areas.”

But Van Heerden said the higher levels of registration showed that more people were interested in voting.

“If we look at the apathy that was there in the previous registration cycles then it’s quite indicative.

“I do expect there will be a higher turnout, especially with the section of the youth we term as ‘born-frees’.

“There has been an extraordinarily high number of youths [nationally] between the ages of 30 and 39 registering to vote.

“It’s anyone’s guess who they will vote for because their decision to a large extent will be based on their lived experience of the past 30 years.”