Ballot counting slowly under way in Namibia after long delays

Namibia tallied votes Thursday after technical problems led to long delays on election day, forcing authorities to extend voting in a pivotal poll set to test the ruling party’s 34-year grip on power.

Logistical issues on Wednesday, including problems with electronic tablets used to check voters’ identities and insufficient ballot papers, left crowds still queueing until the early hours of Thursday in the southern African nation.

Though polls were scheduled to close at 09:00 pm (1900 GMT) on Wednesday, those in line before that time were allowed to stay to cast their ballot, according to Namibia’s electoral law.

Armed with folding chairs and umbrellas to cope with the slow-moving lines and blazing sun, Namibians among the 1.5 million registered voters spent hours waiting outside polling stations, some for up to 12 hours.

At the University of Science and Technology in the capital Windhoek, voting stopped at 05:00 am on Thursday, polling officers told AFP.

“It’s absolutely disappointing,” said Reagan Cooper, a 43-year-old farmer among the hundred or so voters outside the town hall polling station in Windhoek.

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“The voters have turned out, but the electoral commission has failed us,” Cooper told AFP.

In the face of criticism from political parties and voters over the long queues, the Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN) extended voting hours. ECN spokesman Siluka De Wet told AFP on Thursday morning, “some people were still voting.”

Before the delays, initial results were scheduled to be released Saturday.

‘Frustrate voters’

Political parties with candidates running in the simultaneous presidential and legislative races were invited to meet with the ECN at noon Thursday to address complaints about the process.

The opposition Independent Patriots for Change (IPC) is among those who have blamed the electoral body for the long lines and have cried foul.

“We have reason to believe that the ECN is deliberately suppressing voters and deliberately trying to frustrate voters from casting their vote,” said IPC official Christine Aochamus.

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The vote could usher in the desert nation’s first woman leader even as her party, the ruling South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO), faces the strongest challenge to its political dominance since Namibia’s 1990 independence from South Africa.

But SWAPO’s candidate and current vice president, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, could also face an unprecedented second round, according to analysts.

The long queues were “a signal that people really want a change”, said Ndumba Kamwanyah, lecturer in the Department of Human Sciences at the University of Namibia.

“For me, it seems it’s not good news for the incumbent party,” he told AFP.

Unemployment

SWAPO has governed since leading mineral-rich Namibia to independence but complaints about unemployment and enduring inequalities could undermine its standing at this election.

IPC leader Panduleni Itula, a former dentist and lawyer, said Wednesday he was optimistic he could “unseat the revolutionary movement”.

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Namibia is a major uranium and diamond exporter but not many of its nearly three million people have benefited from that wealth.

“There’s a lot of mining activity that goes on in the country, but it doesn’t really translate into improved infrastructure, job opportunities,” said independent political analyst Marisa Lourenco, based in Johannesburg.

“That’s where a lot of the frustration is coming from, (especially) the youth,” she said.

Unemployment among 15- to 34-year-olds is estimated at 46 percent, according to the latest figures from 2018, almost triple the national average.

– © Agence France-Presse