The Electoral Court is due to give a judgement on Monday in a case in which the Khomas Residents and Rate Payers Association is asking to be allowed to take part in the Windhoek City Council election on 26 November.
Three judges of the court - deputy judge president Hannelie Prinsloo and judges Orben Sibeya and Beatrix de Jager - yesterday heard oral arguments on an application in which the association is asking the court to order the Electoral Commission of Namibia (ECN) to accept the nomination of its candidates for the Windhoek City Council election on a physical form, instead of through an internet portal.
The association's secretary general, Shaun Gariseb, is claiming the association was unable to get access to the internet portal used by the ECN for the nomination of election candidates on 16 October, when candidates had to be nominated.
The association is asking the court to review and set aside an alleged decision of the ECN to not accept the nomination of its city council election candidates on a physical form.
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It is also asking the court to declare the ECN's alleged decision to compel the nomination of election candidates through an internet portal as unlawful.
According to the ECN, though, the association has not explicitly identified the decision it wants the court to review and set aside, and there is no decision taken by the ECN to not allow the association to nominate its candidates in the Windhoek City Council election.
The ECN is also saying the association should have approached the Windhoek Electoral Tribunal, instead of the Electoral Court, with its case.
ECN chairperson Elsie Nghikembua says in a sworn statement filed at the court that a list of election candidates could be submitted to the ECN either through its internet portal or physically, by being submitted to the returning officer for the Windhoek local authority election.
The association did not submit its list of candidates to the returning officer, though, but tried to hand it in at the ECN headquarters after the cut-off time of 11h00 on 16 October, Nghikembua says.
Gariseb alleges in an affidavit also filed at the court that the ECN's online political parties and candidates management portal was not gazetted and has not been prescribed, and the ECN has implemented it unlawfully.
While the association did not manage to nominate its candidates for the Windhoek local authority election, Gariseb successfully registered as an independent candidate in the regional council election in the Khomas region's Katutura Central constituency.
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Nghikembua notes in her affidavit that the association approached the court to have an urgent application heard three weeks after the day that election candidates had to be nominated.
Ballot papers for the regional council and local authority elections on 26 November have been printed in South Africa at a cost of about N$4.9 million and were received by the ECN this week, Nghikembua says.
The period to nominate election candidates and have nominations rectified has passed, and there is no legal basis for a new proclamation for the nomination of candidates, according to Nghikembua, who is asking the court to dismiss the association's application due to a lack of urgency.
She also notes that the association has not cited any of the political parties that nominated candidates for the Windhoek City Council election as respondents with the ECN in its case.
That, too, is a reason to dismiss the application, she claims.
The court reserved its judgement after hearing oral arguments from the association's lawyer, Kadhila Amoomo, and Jabulani Ncube, representing the ECN, with Prinsloo saying the judgement would be delivered on Monday.
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