South Africa election portal resumes showing results after glitch

Live updates of partial results from South Africa’s parliamentary election reappeared on the electoral commission’s website, following a glitch of at least two hours.

The prints are closely watched amid early indications that the country’s governing African National Congress, the liberation party of Nelson Mandela, could lose its parliamentary majority for the first time in the 30 years since it assumed governance.

The electoral commission’s portal was briefly blank at 06:08 a.m. London time, but once more displayed results by 08:23 a.m. in London, according to CNBC monitoring.

The commission did not immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment on the interruption in updates. Reuters reported that the disruption was a result of a technical glitch that technicians at the results center in Midrand, north of Johannesburg, were attending to.

Once the portal returned online, its data showed support for the ANC at 41.86% off 55.63% of the ballots, with the Democratic Alliance (DA) at 23.67%, and the Marxist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) securing 19.98%.

A final result near the current preliminary 42% would be a steep tumble for the ANC, which last earned 57.5% of support in the 2019 election. It would also propel incumbent President Cyril Ramaphosa to begin negotiations for a coalition government, stoking political uncertainty that could bleed into the country’s economic prospects.