democracy

The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) says there will be a logistical nightmare if the Local Government Election system is changed to allow voters to cast their ballots anywhere in the country, if they are outside their voting districts on Election Day.

IEC deputy chairperson, Terry Tselane, says, “On the day of Local Government Elections, we have got 4 649 different ballot papers, so if you are registered in Johannesburg in a particular ward, your ward is going to be different from a person who is in Kimberley.”

Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) executive director, Siphosami Malunga, says the region would not have been liberated without Zambia’s contribution.

Malunga says it is also encouraging that Africa has chosen to embrace democracy as its form of governance.

Speaking during in Lusaka recently during the launch of the Zambia Elections Information Centre (ZEIC), he pointed out that, “I must say that I am very proud of Zambia. I know that Zambians probably know better about their country than I ever will. I have a lot of pride in Zambia.”

A research report shows that voters, particularly in poor communities, believe that the handing out of food parcels during elections campaigns amounts to vote buying.
 
This month Public Protector Thuli Madonsela found that the distribution of food parcels in 2009 by Julius Malema, then leader of the African National Congress (ANC) Youth League, was an abuse of state resources.
 

In the last municipal election in 2011, only 28 percent of young people aged 20-29 voted.

Before the first registration weekend for the poll this August, the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) says more than 80 percent of the 9.1-million eligible voters who are not registered were under 35 years old.

If young people don’t vote, their concerns will not carry enough weight in the halls of power, and policy will ignore the needs of young people.

According to Joleen Steyn Kotze, if one tracks South African student activities in 2015, it becomes apparent that a new politics is bubbling below the surface of academic life.

Kotze states that this first emerged with the #RhodesMustFall and #OpenStellenbosch protests, followed more recently by #FeesMustFall, adding that, “The underlying issues driving this movement are about citizenship, belonging, inclusion and exclusion.”

Chairperson of South African National Editors Forum's Media Freedom Committee and Editor of Beeld newspaper, Adriaan Basson, says the country has a reason to celebrate Media Freedom Day.
 
The country marks Media Freedom Day, the day is a reminder of Black Wednesday, 1977, when apartheid Justice Minister Jimmy Kruger outlawed three newspapers, The World, The Weekend World and the Voice.
 

An Afrobarometer survey shows that satisfaction with democracy remains elusive, as just 51 percent of citizens surveyed in 28 African countries believed their country was a full democracy, or one with just a few problems.
 
Of the 51 percent of respondents who expressed satisfaction with the country’s democracy, 18 percent believed they lived in a full democracy, and 34 percent in a democracy with some challenges.
 
The Afrobarometer survey is based on 41 953 face-to-face interviews in 28 African countries, excluding South Africa, since June last year.