As of press time on Thursday afternoon, spokesperson for the electoral management body Osupile Maroba said although they had not consolidated the entire numbers across the country, they could confirm that over 80% of voters had cast their votes. The IEC had stated that a total of 1,037,684 Batswana had registered to vote. For Batswana living in the diaspora, a total number of 2,031 had registered but only 1,104 voted, tallying 54%. For early voters, which comprised civil servants who were on duty during the election period, the IEC had expected 1,282 but the number of voters increased to a staggering 16,013. Comparing the voter turnout to 2019, Maroba said their data reveals that in the last General Election, they recorded 75% of voters from those who had registered, marking an increase in this cycle.
“Then, we had 725,000 voters from the 925,000 that had registered. This year, as you know, we had 1,037,684 registered voters and 80% of them have voted,” Maroba confirmed. Meanwhile, the IEC Secretary, Jeff Siamisang said when voting began most polling stations started on time except for a few that had minor delays, but by 8am on October 30, the election process had begun.
