Another voting scandal has rocked The Voice SA.
M-Net announced on Tuesday evening that none of the five remaining talent in The Voice SA will be going home this coming Sunday.
In addition, M-Net has also given Luke Lovemore and PJ Pretorius, who received the fewest votes in the previous two weeks, the option to return to the show. As such, the voting lines have been closed.
The decision was made in the interests of fairness and transparency, after M-Net was alerted about alleged paid-for marketing efforts (boosted posts) on some of the talent’s personal social media accounts.
Investigation into paid-for marketing
Paid-for marketing, which is against the rules of the competition, can cause voting spikes which could provide an unfair advantage.
This prompted M-Net to conduct an investigation into the way in which these efforts could have affected the outcome of the voting results. It was ascertained that only the past two voting periods, in which Luke Lovemore and PJ Pretorius left the competition, could have been affected.
“Despite our best efforts, we could not determine with certainty whether misconduct took place and what the impact was on the voting results. We believe the fairest solution under these circumstances is to give all the affected talent another chance,” says Nkateko Mabaso, GM for M-Net South Africa.
“The Voice SA has proved to be an excellent platform for launching the careers of new singing talent and we would like encourage our viewers to continue to vote for their favourites”.
The winner of The Voice SA will be determined by the votes of the viewing public and will be announced during the finale on Sunday, 9 July.
The vote results are independently computed by Deloitte and Touche and confirmed against the vote results determined by M-Net.
Not the first time
This is not the first time the talent show has been plagued by voting woes.
In season 1 about 8 000 votes was lost during a round in the competition.
The finale was also marred by a voting glitch when technical problems resulted in the voting platforms not working. According to M-Net the voting platforms folded due to an avalanche of votes that were cast during the live show.
The finale was also marred by a voting glitch when technical problems resulted in the voting platforms not working. According to M-Net the voting platforms folded due to an avalanche of votes that were cast during the live show.
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