GOOD Party to review Helen Zille’s Johannesburg registration, may mount legal challenge

The GOOD Party has asked its legal team to advise whether Helen Zille’s registration in Johannesburg meets the Electoral Act’s requirements, and says it will challenge her mayoral candidacy if advisers conclude it does not comply.

Party seeks legal advice on ordinary-residence rules

GOOD secretary-general and Western Cape MPL Brett Herron told the party had asked its legal team to consider whether Zille’s registration in Johannesburg complies with sections 7(3) and 8(3) of the Electoral Act and, if not, what remedies are available.

Residency questions raised

According to GOOD, section 7(3) defines ordinary residence as “the home where a person normally lives and regularly returns to after a temporary absence.” The party said Zille had made her home in Cape Town for more than 40 years and pointed to Zille’s own public account that her husband, his church and their retirement village are in Cape Town.

GOOD said Zille “regularly returns home and would not commit to staying in Johannesburg if she loses.” Herron said:

“Section 8(3) requires a voter to be registered only in the ward where they are ordinarily resident. Zille’s presence in Johannesburg looks suspiciously like a temporary absence from Cape Town, where she ordinarily resides, not a change of hometown.”

Possible legal challenge

GOOD told its members it would wait for advice from its legal team before deciding whether to challenge Zille’s candidacy. Herron said:

“If GOOD is advised that Zille’s candidacy is unlawful, it will be challenged in the appropriate legal forum.”

GOOD also defending PR lists in court

Separately, GOOD is defending its proportional-representation (PR) candidate lists in the Electoral Court after the Democratic Alliance challenged the PR lists submitted by GOOD, ActionSA, the EFF and MK.

GOOD said its PR list, containing one named candidate in each of the 25 municipalities it is contesting, complied with the law and was certified by the IEC. Herron described the DA application as:

“bad-faith desperation to manufacture legal technicalities and voter confusion, and subvert voters’ choices.”

GOOD argued that neither the Municipal Electoral Act nor the Municipal Structures Act prescribes a minimum number of names on a party list and said the Municipal Structures Act provides that where a party wins more seats than it has names on its list, the IEC must notify the party and ask it to add eligible candidates within two days.

On the DA’s reliance on what GOOD called the “‘honest underestimation’ test,” Herron said that test “appears nowhere in the Act.” He also said GOOD asked the IEC in writing before submitting its lists whether single-candidate lists were permissible and that “supplementing lists after the election enables parties to reward ward candidates who drew strong support, recognise excellent campaign work, match expertise to responsibilities – and, ultimately, maximise the quality of public representatives.” Herron added:

“GOOD will defend its lists in court; they comply with the law as Parliament wrote it, not as the DA would prefer it to have been written.”

IEC contact

According to IOL, the news outlet “has reached out to the IEC for comment and will update this story if a response is received.”

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