Cacadu votes for new ANC councillor

Protesting Cacadu residents took a break from burning tyres to elect a new councillor on Wednesday – giving the ANC a landslide 86.5% victory.

However, this was down from the 94% that the ruling party garnered in ward 6 when thousands of residents elected former councillor Zanele Koni. The vacancy was created when Koni was redeployed from Emalahleni municipality to head up the corporate services portfolio committee in the Chris Hani district municipality.

Residents, who have been protesting against poor service delivery in Cacadu and Dordrecht since Sunday, went to the polls on Wednesday and placed their faith in Nicholas James, who retained the ward for the ANC.

ANC provincial executive committee member Zandisile Qupe attributed the convincing electoral win to a united party in the region.

He said having provincial and national leaders like ANC deputy president David Mabuza campaign for the party had helped convince residents.

“We worked hard doing door-to- door campaigning,” he said.

Qupe said the protest in Cacadu town and Dordrecht did not have any impact on the by-elections and this shows that “people still love the ANC”.

The IEC said voter turnout was 51.17%. — tembiles@dispatch.co.za