South Africa needs electoral reform to affirm and strengthen political accountability – and help boost popular engagement with the electoral process and democracy in general, says the Institute of Race Relations (IRR)
In a statement, the IRR points out that the Electoral Amendment Act passed last year “is flawed and created an unwieldy system, effectively turning each of the nine provinces into a very large multi-member constituency”.
Says IRR researcher Marius Roodt: “The electoral system used in the May election was the result of a haphazard and half-hearted attempt at electoral reform. It showed that the government was not interested in establishing an electoral system which helped increase the accountability of our public representatives.”
Roodt points out that much of the thinking around electoral reform has already been done.
“There are a number of potential electoral systems that we can use which would help increase accountability. These range from replicating the system we use at municipal level at provincial and national level, to the recommendations of the Van Zyl Slabbert Commission report from two decades ago. Any of these would be better than the flawed system used in May,” Roodt says.
The IRR says that in the push for electoral reform and greater accountability from public representatives, the launch last week of the Civil Society Electoral Reform Panel is to be welcomed.
Notes Roodt: “This is a welcome development and we hope that it can help push the electoral reform debate in South Africa in the correct direction.”
Roodt adds that the establishment of the GNU enhances the opportunity to push electoral reform.
“South Africa faces many challenges and reforms are needed in a wide range of sectors. However, the focus should not be solely on economic reforms, as important as these are. There are many other areas that need reforming and the country’s electoral system is one of them,” Roodt says.
He argues that the continued decline in voter turnout in South Africa is a serious concern, but that electoral reform may go some way in halting it.
“South Africans are increasingly checking out of the electoral process, which poses a threat to democracy’s legitimacy in this country. Electoral reform won’t be a silver bullet but if it can go some way to improving accountability and getting South Africans re-engaged in the electoral process, as well as the broader democratic process, it is something that we should do,” Roodt concludes.
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