The total of 20 029 votes for the DA (provincial ballot) against the 17 568 for the ANC is a clear sign that the people of Kouga have spoken and voted for change! Kouga is clearly DA country and it bodes well for the next local government elections in 2016.
Activists in Tokyo Sexwale in Ward 14
Although the DA has a majority in Kouga, there cannot be a take-over of the local municipality by the DA as this was not a local government election, but provincial and national election. However the swing towards the DA is clear that the people of Kouga will no longer tolerate the poor ANC administration and delivery.
The DA retained Ward 3 (Lower Wavecrest), Ward 4 (Kruisfontein), Ward 5 (Arcadia), Ward 8 (Upper Wavecrest), Ward 11 (Jeffreys Bay CBD & C-Place) and Ward 12 (St Francis). The DA support increased substantially in most of these wards.
However a major scoop was the DA victory in Pellsrus, which has always been a traditional ANC stronghold. The significant DA majority in this ward amounted to 280 votes.
In Ward 8 (upper Wavecrest) the DA made a clean sweep by obtaining 3290 votes against the mere 142 votes for the ANC in the ward.
Although the DA did extremely well in Ward 14 (Aston Bay, Paradise Beach & Tokyo Sexwale) with a total of 1705 votes against the ANC total of 1723, it lost by a small margin of 18 votes. Once again a smaller party split vote of 71 for the FF+ caused an ANC victory in this ward.
In DA Wards 4 (Kruisfontein) and 5 (Arcadia), where four ANC councillors reside, including the ANC mayor, the people showed their dismay in the ANC regime in Kouga. In both these wards the DA scored resounding victories where the people again rebelled against the ANC governance in the municipality.
Although the DA did not gain a majority in Ward 7 (Thornhill, Loerie), the marginal result for the ANC of only 188 votes, showed considerable gain in DA support.
History was made in Ward 15 where Humansdorp voted at the Country Club Voting District. For the first time the DA obtained a victory at that voting district by 225 votes.
The remarkable DA growth in the Gamtoos Valley speaks volumes. The DA won no less than seven voting districts in the four wards namely:
Ward 7: Kleinfontein and Highlands;
Ward 9: Hankey Civic and Vuyo Katoo;
Ward 10: Cockscomb (Cambria);
Ward 13: Laerskool Gamtoos (Patensie) and Ex Enathi.
The DA is disputing the results at the Vusumsi Landu Hall in Hankey where the votes counted are more than the ballot papers issued on both national and provincial ballot papers! An official objection has been submitted at the IEC national offices.
The Democratic Alliance leadership in Kouga wishes to express our heartfelt gratitude to our voters for the excellent support during these elections. It is clear that the people of Kouga will no longer accept the poor ANC service delivery, lack of maintenance of infrastructure, the deterioration of all our towns and the lack of development in this municipality.
The support of our national and provincial leaders was inspiring during their many public appearances throughout our election campaign. Our appreciation goes to Helen Zille, DA National Leader, Athol Trollip, DA EC Provincial Leader, Patricia de Lille, Mayor of Cape Town, Donald Lee, Helen Lamoela and many other Members of Parliament early on in the campaign.
The DA professional staff at national and provincial level rendered world class electioneering strategies and support.
We also wish to sincerely thank our donors who made this formidable ground war possible. It is important to also recognise the extreme efforts by the DA election team, consisting of all our Councillors and branch structures. We also express a special word of thanks to our local DA staff, activists, party agents and other election-day volunteers who made this victory possible.
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