Elections Roadshow: Eastern Cape

Who could have imagined that close on 30 years into our democracy the Eastern Cape - birthplace to ANC stalwarts like Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo, Walter Sisulu and Chris Hani - would be arguably the country’s worst performing province?

𝗧𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗼𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗮𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝗼𝗻 𝟱 𝗝𝘂𝗻𝗲 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟮. It’s a terrifying ordeal: foreign nationals are abducted, tied up, and tortured. Then, unrealistic ransoms demanded by their armed captors - brazen criminals preying on foreign businessmen in the Eastern Cape. It’s the MO at the centre of a new but increasingly common crime. Claire Mawisa travelled to Mthatha to investigate.

At the 2022 South African Junior Athletics Championships, it took just 11 seconds for a young woman from the Eastern Cape to make a global impact on the track. She smashed the national record for the 100-metre sprint and also set a new under-18 record for the 200-metres (which had remained unbroken for exactly 40 years), Viwe Jingqi is now the fastest under-18 female in the world. Now, the 17-year-old sprinter is aiming to represent South Africa at the next Olympic Games and bring home the medals.

During the month of October, in the run-up to the local government elections, Carte Blanche visited Limpopo, the Eastern Cape, the Free State and the North West provinces to gauge what issues really matter to voters. Follow our journey.