Former National Freedom Party leader says court rescue reopens 2016 wound

• Mashinini-Maphumulo says the ruling clearing 181 African National Congress candidates reopened the pain of the National Freedom Party’s 2016 exclusion.

• The Electoral Court rejected her old party in 2016 and the African National Congress in September. Only one was saved.

Sindi Mashinini-Maphumulo says this month’s Constitutional Court ruling for the African National Congress (ANC) has reopened the pain of 2016, when the Electoral Court rejected the National Freedom Party’s (NFP) bid to contest the elections.

On 15 October, the Constitutional Court overturned an Electoral Court ruling and ordered the Electoral Commission to put 181 of the ANC’s candidates on the ballot in six municipalities. The party uploaded its lists, but they were not marked final on the Commission’s online system by the 28 August deadline. The ANC said the system glitched, and the Commission said it did not.

“I am not even angry, I am livid about this latest decision that favoured the ANC. We tried everything possible in 2016 to plead with the IEC and went to court,” Mashinini told Scrolla.Africa.

In 2016, the National Freedom Party was left off the ballot after paying its required deposit on 22 June, 20 days after the 2 June deadline. The Electoral Court dismissed its application in June, and again on 5 August.

“It was one of the most painful decisions I will never forget in my life,” Mashinini-Maphumulo said.

She said many people had hoped to vote for the party as a thank-you to founder Zanele kaMagwaza-Msibi, who was recovering from a stroke.

The Commission announced last Thursday that it would grant relief to 32 other parties in the same position as the ANC, covering 121 municipalities.

Mashinini-Maphumulo’s new political party, AMC.Roy, is on the ballot, but was not one of the 32.

Mashinini-Maphumulo was a member of the Inkatha Freedom Party, the National Freedom Party, the United Democratic Movement and the Allied Movement for Change before joining AMC.Roy, which Roy Moodley formed after the African Movement Congress expelled him in December 2025.