Police Minister Bheki Cele says a late surge of voters is expected at many voting stations in the province this afternoon with some presiding officers fearing that people may have consumed alcohol prior to voting. Police Minister Bheki Cele at one of the voting stations in KwaMashu, north of Durban. Picture: Screen grab.
DURBAN - Police Minister Bheki Cele says a late surge of voters is expected at many voting stations in the province this afternoon.
He said they expected voters to descend on voting stations in larger numbers before the 9pm deadline set by the Electoral Commission of South Africa.
Cele was conducting a walkabout at one of the voting stations in KwaMashu, north of Durban on Monday. On Sunday, Cele said that police officers had been deployed to hot spot areas across the province. He said that by Sunday afternoon, 128 high risk voting stations had been identified.
“We will do an hour by hour assessment of the voting stations where there may be a need to beef up security,” said Cele .
He said he was concerned that some people had used voting day, which is a public holiday, to buy and drink alcoholic beverages.
“The fear from some presiding officers is that when people come back here having been in the places of pleasure (where they consumed alcohol) there could be some chaos and we have to be ready for that,” the minister continued.
While there had been isolated incidents of disruption in some voting stations, Cele said he was satisfied with how voting was proceeding in many parts of KZN and other areas of the country.
THE MERCURY
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