‘IEC adequately funded to manage elections’, says National Treasury after voting day setbacks

The National Treasury has refuted claims that budget cuts were the primary cause of the challenges the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) faced on voting day.

Eligible voters who arrived to cast their ballots in this year’s national and provincial elections on 29 May encountered long queues and technical issues with the voter management devices.

Additionally, the delayed delivery of ballot boxes further hindered the voting process.

This prompted suggestions that the issues were a consequence of budget cuts to the IEC over the past three years, impacting the commission’s ability to effectively manage the general election.

IEC budget

The National Treasury, however, has dismissed such claims, asserting that the IEC was well funded.

“While budget reductions were announced in the 2024 budget to address the country’s unsustainable debt burden, measures were taken to specifically ensure that requirements for the elections are adequately resourced,” Treasury’s statement reads.

For the 2024/2025 financial year, the IEC was allocated R2.3 billion to deliver free and fair elections.

The commission’s budget was cut by R31 million as part of the government’s austerity measures.

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Despite this, the IEC was approved by Treasury to retain its accumulated surplus of R1.5 billion and benefitted further from an additional allocation of R350 million for the security of the election process.

“As part of the 2024 budget process, the National Treasury continuously engaged with the IEC on its funding requirements for the 2024 national and provincial elections.

“The National Treasury’s engagements with the IEC confirmed that the costs related to elections can be accommodated within the entity’s baseline through surplus retention.”

The finance department highlighted that the IEC had indicated that it would not require any additional allocation for election-related activities provided that approval was granted for them to retain R1.5 billion surplus.

Media Briefing Human Sciences Research Council to present preliminary findings of the Election Satisfaction Survey https://t.co/WPA9nISKUR

— IEC South Africa (@IECSouthAfrica) May 31, 2024

Treasury further explained that the IEC received R322 million of the total budget in April, while R1 billion will be transferred to the commission between May and June.

“Assertions in the media about the budget baseline trends of the IEC reflect an incomplete reading of the budget documentation and a misunderstanding of both the budget process and the nature of the challenges faced by the IEC and experienced by voters during election day.”

IEC election programmes

Earlier this year, the IEC told Parliament that most of the budget would go toward its electoral operations programme, which was R1.29 billion.

The commission revealed at the time that the electoral operations were underfunded, but it used the surplus from the previous financial year to cover the programme.

The other programmes included administration, outreach and party funding. With R911.6 million, R236.9 million and R25 million being budgeted for each respectively.

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