policyxchange posted: "RICHARD WILKINSON 18 JULY 2013 The South African Constitution does not allow the President to hire and fire provincial premiers in the way that he or she can reshuffle Ministers in his or her Cabinet. In theory, the provincial sphere of government is " Respond to this post by replying above this line New post on POLICYXCHANGE All Power to the Party: How SA’s electoral system weakens its system of federalism by policyxchange RICHARD WILKINSON 18 JULY 2013 The South African Constitution does not allow the President to hire and fire provincial premiers in the way that he or she can reshuffle Ministers in his or her Cabinet. In theory, the provincial sphere of government is distinct from that of the national and local spheres and when South Africans vote every five years they vote for national and provincial governments on two separate ballot sheets. Why then, has Limpopo Premier Cassel Mathale been forced out of office, ostensibly at the behest of President Jacob Zuma? The answer lies not in our system of federalism but rather in the weakness of our electoral system. South Africa does not have constituencies whereby the people living in a particular geographic area elect a specific Member of Parliament who is then mandated to represent his or her constituents’ views in the respective legislature. Such a system, as occurs in the United Kingdom and the United States allows for a clear link to be established between the people and their representatives. For example, Jesse Norman is the MP for Hereford and South Herefordshire in the west of England; in addition to being Prime Minister David Cameron represents the 78 220 voters who live in Witney. Rather, South Africa follows a system of closed-list proportional representation. What this means is that political parties such as the ANC, DA, Agang and the EFF nominate a lists of up to 400 candidates before the national election. Seats are then allocated according to the proportion of votes that each party receives. If the ANC gets 60%, then the first 240/400 of its candidates will get elected. In Limpopo in 2009 the ANC received 85% of the vote – the party therefore received 43 of the 49 seats in the provincial legislature. Simple as that. There are a number of problems with this. Firstly, the process by which candidates are selected and ranked on the lists is almost entirely unregulated. How the ANC and DA undertake this process is up to the parties to determine. The inevitable result is that the general public is cut out of this Kafkaesque preliminary selection process which is typically marred by violence and chaos. Secondly, MP’s only retain their seats in the legislature for so long as they remain members of their political parties. Again, how parties determine who is or is not a member, and how members are expelled is entirely up to them. The opportunities for abuse are plain to see. For example, if a political party experiences a major change of leadership in the middle of a term of Parliament (as occurred to the ANC in Polokwane in December 2007), the party’s entire parliamentary caucus could be fired and reconstituted without a national election even being held. So what happened in Limpopo? I don’t know the details, but there are at least two clear reasons why Mathale would find himself under irresistible pressure should Luthuli House (ANC HQ) decide that he needed to go. Firstly, Luthuli House could instruct the ANC’s Members of the Provincial Legislature to vote against the Premier in a motion of no confidence, thereby ejecting Mathale from office. Alternatively, Luthuli House could terminate Mathale’s membership of the ANC which would then automatically terminate his membership of the provincial legislature. Normally, a Premier whose party holds 43/49 seats would be able to defend his or her position in a vote of no confidence – and in a democracy worthy of the name the 43 ANC members of the provincial legislature would consult their constituents (not their party HQ) as to how they should vote. Alas, not in South Africa where all power gravitates away from the people and is centralised in an ugly office block on the corner of Sauer Street in Johannesburg. Above all, this demonstrates the old maxim made famous by Margaret Thatcher and which is so apt in a country where cries of “Amandla” punctuate ANC rallies: “Socialists cry ‘Power to the people,’ and raise the clenched fist as they say it. We all know what they really mean is power over the people, power to the State.”
Posted on: Thu, 18 Jul 2013 10:49:08 +0000
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