Election queue style: From sloppy to casual, with a few snappy dressers

It might have been one of the most important elections since South Africa became a democracy, but nobody really dressed up for it. People turned up, but did not turn out.

It was no Durban July save for a few whose sole purpose, bar making a mark on the ballot, was a selfie and a social reel.

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The early morning queues looked just as you would expect. Fluffy, warm comfort clobber in various drab colours. Jackets in shades of well-worn blues, flabby tracksuit pants, sneakers and beanies.

One person in the queue shared that she was wearing her granny’s jacket, her sister’s sweater and pyjama pants.

Can’t go back to bed

Ten hours later, when she was still in one of the lines that threaded into a dysfunctional voting station, a first-time voting experience had become the decimation of plans to head back to bed after casting a ballot.

Guys were in hoodies in the early morning and pants that were, in varying degrees, straight from the clobber of the great unwashed. Few had shaved.

This was a common theme throughout the suburbs, from the east to the west, even the middle-North’s males did not bother too much, bar the handful that had to head back to work after voting. But everyone was in exceptionally good spirits.

Later, the look changed and men were somewhat more presentable, cleaner shaven or with trimmed beards. It was T-shirts and golf shirts with sneakers as it warmed up.

Women were mostly in leggings and jackets and almost every second person donned a cap or a floppy fisherman’s hat.

For about an hour at one of the voting stations, nearly every woman was wearing a white fedora or Panama hat. It was a gangster-look a few months too late to trend on TikTok. But there were exceptions.

There were tarted-up voters toting Gucci bags, real or otherwise, in tailored suits, pants and blouses. Dotted around, it was possible to play spot the Housewives of Election Day.

The screaming pink tights of one voter had everyone reaching for their shades. What was interesting was how the political parties and their agents branded themselves, or not. In this category, ActionSA won the best-dressed political party hands down.

Not a single party agent at any of the voting stations this journalist visited saw anyone not in a neatly ironed party-branded shirt.

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The Economic Freedom Fighters had some folk in T-shirts and others in garments that might solicit a handout at a traffic light.

The Democratic Alliance staffers, volunteers and agents were well-dressed bar at a couple of voting stations where some party agents were in slippers and kopdoek or shorts, baggy T-shirts and other clothes that made them indistinguishable from voters.

The Freedom Front Plus folk were neat and branded but the uncles should rather get a size bigger than the girth that they might believe they have.

The sole uMkhonto weSizwe party member spotted was turned out better than George Clooney and the Patriotic Alliance’s Gayton McKenzie could use the same advice as the uncles in the Freedom Front Plus.

The ANC deserved second place. They were neatly garbed and colour-coordinated. In the queues, there was no clear winner of the title of bestdressed.

But, finally, in a pub adjacent to a voting station, a voter won hands down. Eddie Kotze of Sunninghill was having a beer in a black, longsleeved, collared shirt and black jeans. Simple, striking and well accessorised with the right beverage after a long day