Elections driven by volunteers

Some people may be unaware that South African general elections are predominantly run by volunteers. All they receive is a small stipend for subsistence and travel. According to Western Cape Electoral Officer Courtney Sampson, the 1578 polling stations and 2.941 million voters registered in the Western Cape will be attended to by approximately 20 000 IEC volunteers.

The IEC recruit locally via a process of putting up adverts at municipalities, police stations, libraries and the like, as well as drawing on their database of existing volunteers.

Included in the volunteers are each polling station’s Presiding Officers and Deputy Presiding Officer who are closely vetted. “Those are the two most critical people in the voting process, in the voting station. Their names are presented to the local party liaison committees and they have an opportunity to object to any of the names on the list based on whether the person is a high profile member of a political party, an executive member of a political party or a political representative of a party in the last five years,” says Sampson.

Presiding and Deputy Presiding Officers have all been trained by the IEC and the pre-election training involves the counting, filling in of the results slips, everything. The training happens over a weekend.

“The Presiding Officer is a crucial job because you need someone who can interpret the legislation, manage the crowds and manage the entire environment where the election is taking place.” adds Sampson.

As for other volunteers, in order for the IEC to contract them, they need to provide their ID and bank details. Volunteers need to be South African citizens as well as registered voters. “One of the criteria that is high on our list is to recruit people who are unemployed” says Sampson, adding the IEC also prioritises young people.

These volunteers fulfill all roles including queue walkers where they check IDs, scannimg IDs to check the voters are at the correct voting station, ticking names off the voters roll, inking on thumbs. There are approximately 12 – 15 volunteers assigned to each polling station. IEC staff members, on the other hand, are involved in over-seeing the process such as ensuring ballots are delivered and general trouble shooting.