The Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) believes that not all chance-takers should have an easy pass at the ballot box come the much-anticipated national and provincial elections in 2024.
Such a situation would make a mockery of democracy and the informed choice voters need to make when choosing who must lead them in the national and provincial legislatures, according to IEC chief Sy Mamabolo.
Any open season where there are no barriers to sifting through who is serious and those who are not allowed to fester will lead to “frivolous” parties and independents taking everyone for a ride.
Mamabolo spoke to Sunday World Engage this week. He said it was for this reason that parliament introduced barriers, including the requirement that a party or independent ??? must have at least 15 000 signatures and an entry deposit to enter the race.
For its part, the IEC is consulting on the quantum of that proposed election entry deposit in order to keep out rogue elements.
Political parties and independent candidates of all sorts, good and nefarious, are mushrooming everywhere ahead of next year’s elections.
The elections are expected to be the biggest ever that the IEC has had to run since the dawn of the democratic dispensation in 1994.
As if too many political parties were not enough, the situation has been exacerbated by the Electoral Amendment Act that was signed into law.
The law allows independents to contest for national and provincial seats for the first time ever.
As things stand under the current election regime, Mamabolo revealed that the IEC will have a new ballot paper that has never been part of the national elections.
This means that the commission might have to print more than 30million more papers than normal, which will lead to more financial implications and administrative headaches.
Mamabolo said proper and clear rules of engagement were critical in order to avoid polls turning into a circus that would drive voters mad.
“Our democracy is built around a set of rules and procedures, and the rules that are set for entry must be rational and not set too high so as to impede non-participation.
“But they must be there nonetheless to ensure that it is not a frivolous contest. It must be a real and genuine contest between candidates and parties of substance,” Mamabolo laid down the law.
In his view, it was paramount to maintain decorum and protect voters from unnecessary abuse by chance-takers in the upcoming elections, like others did before.
The key to this was to strike a balance between open participation for those intending to contest and the voters, who must have a real choice instead of a meaningless box-ticking exercise with not only long but many ballot papers.
“A real choice means the ability to work on a ballot paper that is readable and that voters can manage from beginning to end. If you are going to have a number of contestants so big that it obfuscates the choice, I think that would impair the right of the voter to make an informed choice.
“All those things are not introduced because they are niceties. They are introduced to ensure that there is no frivolity in the contest and that only those parties and contestants of substance make it to the ballot, in the interest of the voter ultimately.”
To those arguing that this move impedes the constitutional right to political participation and contesting an election that is for all, Mamabolo said, “Democracy is not laissez-faire.”
“If you want to have an orderly election, it must be underpinned by certain rules of engagement that are not arbitrary. They must be well-considered and fair for everybody, including the voter who is going to be using the ballot paper.”
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