DA support increases by 1 million votes: Party

[LazyLion]

Support for the Democratic Alliance was expected to increase by about a million votes in the 2014 national elections, the party's campaign manager Jonathan Moakes said on Friday.

"We got 16.7 percent in 2009 -- we are probably on track to get just over 22 percent, so I think it is an increase of about a third," he said.

"In absolute numbers we are probably going to increase by approximately a million votes."

He said going into the fifth national democratic elections the party aimed for significant growth in all nine provinces.

In the 2009 elections, the DA received 16.66 percent of votes, while it received 12.37 percent of the votes in the 2004 elections. Support for the party may increase by five percent.

The DA was satisfied with what they achieved in the elections, he said.

"I think there are some good results. Within our expectations we are pretty happy," Moakes said.

He said the growth was attributed to a good campaign and communicating with the electorate.

Parliamentary leader Lindiwe Mazibuko was excited with the prospect of the party being the official opposition in KwaZulu-Natal.

"I can't tell you how excited I am with the DA being the opposition in KwaZulu-Natal. It means my leader Sizwe Mchunu will be the opposition leader. It is my home province," she said.

Mazibuko said despite their gains, work still remained to grow more and put pressure on the African National Congress.

According to early results, the DA had 22.01 percent of the votes with 3,694,392 votes nationally after 95.37 percent of votes had been counted.


Source : Sapa /dm/kn/gq/jje/jk
Date : 09 May 2014 10:05

 

[LazyLion]

DA SUPPORT MAY INCREASE

Support for the Democratic Alliance could increase by over five percent in the fifth national democratic elections with more than 90 percent of votes counted on Friday morning.

According to early results, the DA have 22.03 percent of the votes with 3,605,019 votes nationally in Wednesday's elections after 94.09 percent of votes had been counted.

In the 2009 elections, the DA received 16.66 percent of votes, while it received 12.37 percent of the votes in the 2004 elections.

According to the results at the Electoral Commission of SA's results centre in Pretoria on Friday morning, the African National Congress had 62.51 percent of the votes by 6am with 10,228,644 votes.

In the 2009 elections the ruling party won with 65.9 percent of the votes.

In 2004, the ANC won with 69.69 percent compared to the 66.35 percent in 1999 and the 62.65 percent in 1994.

On Friday, the early results indicated that the new kids on the block, the Economic Freedom Fighters were in third place with 5.95 percent of the votes and 973,369 votes.

The Inkatha Freedom Party had 404,692 (2.47 percent) votes according to Friday morning's early results.

The National Freedom Party remained in fifth place with 1.64 percent of the national votes.

The results centre was quiet on Friday morning with tired party officials and media waiting for the results to be updated. Shortly after 5.30am police took sniffer dogs through the centre.

A total of 16,362,869 votes had been counted.


Source : Sapa /dm/fg/ks
Date : 09 May 2014 06:17

 

[AstroTurf]

Last stretch

 

[LazyLion]

BLACK SUPPORT GROWS FOR DA

The Democratic Alliance has seen an increase in the number of black supporters, the party said on Friday.

"We grew our support among black South Africans from 0.8 percent in 2009 to approximately six percent in 2014," party leader Helen Zille told reporters at the Electoral Commission of SA's (IEC) national results operations centre in Pretoria.

"Roughly 760,000 black South Africans voted for the DA."

Zille said 40 percent of the votes were won in Gauteng. She added that the number of black DA voters was more than the Inkatha Freedom Party, National Freedom Party, Pan Africanist Congress, and United Christian Democratic Party combined.

It was also more than any other party besides the African National Congress and Economic Freedom Fighters.

"Twenty percent of our votes in this election were cast by black South Africans. The DA is the only party that has grown consistently in every election since 1994 when we won just 1.7 percent," she said.

Other parties had come and gone but the DA kept winning and growing, Zille said.

"We are stronger, and bigger than ever."

The results were an indication that people's political attitudes were changing, and more people were moving away from race as a voting determinant.

"This is encouraging for the future of our democracy," said Zille.


Source : Sapa /kn/jk
Date : 09 May 2014 14:17

 

[Bizkit87]

Lets just hope there is some SA left when they get enough votes to make a difference

 

[Priapus]

Lets just hope there is some SA left when they get enough votes to make a difference

I'm with you there!
At the current rate though we are looking at 2024 elections before change happens.