The Mowbray Muslim Cemetery Board election has moved into the counting and verification phase after the online voting process closed on Tuesday afternoon.
The election, which is being overseen by an independent panel appointed by the court, saw 53 candidates contesting 11 positions following a lengthy legal dispute over the governance of the cemetery.
Speaking to VOC News, chairperson of the independent election panel, Attorney Ighsaan Higgins, says the physical voting process held at the Castle on Sunday went smoothly, but the online component experienced several technical and administrative challenges.
He says discrepancies included missing email addresses, missing ID numbers and duplicate email addresses used across multiple applications.
“Unfortunately, there were a lot of glitches, but alhamdulillah, we have managed to sort out most of that,” Higgins says.
The panel extended the online voting period by 48 hours after some voters failed to receive their voting access details. A further court directive was obtained to allow the extension.
Higgins says the next step is to reconcile the votes and identify any instances where people may have voted both physically and online.
The official count will then take place under the supervision of an auditor and in the presence of independent observers, before the results are verified and reported back to the court.
Higgins says he cannot give a specific timeframe for the announcement of the results, as several checks and balances still need to be completed.
“We will endeavour to do it as soon as possible, but we need to do all the checks and balances,” he says.
Photo: VOCfm
