Johannesburg - While all eyes are firmly on the big three political parties' results, the Freedom Front Plus (FF+) has emerged as the unexpected success story of the 2019 general elections.
The party has thus far garnered over 120 000 votes in the national results, with 29.59% of the counting completed thus far. They currently occupy the fourth spot behind the ANC, which is leading the pack, followed by the DA and EFF.
In Gauteng, the party sits at 23 491, also in fourth position behind the big three parties.
FF+ Gauteng deputy chairperson Philip van Staden said despite it being the early stages, the party was feeling positive about the results so far.
"It's still early days but the total number of votes [tallied thus far] on the board is getting to be more at this stage than what we had in the final tally in 2014.
"Our final tally in 2014 was 165 000, so we're going to move into a trend. What is interesting at this stage is our percentage is standing at 3.36% and in 2014 in total we received 0.901%."
Van Staden credited their early success to their campaigning across the country.
He said in Gauteng, where the party held one seat in legislature over the past five years, the party expected significant growth in these elections.
"It's still slow on the provincial trends at the moment but I think we will grow significantly, we predict that we will end [up] with 3-4 members," he told IOL.
Results continue trickling in. The IEC is expected to hold a media briefing on the vote counting at 11am.