Warwick Bruce Chapman

I am becoming increasingly aware that most South Africans don’t full understand the structure of Government in South Africa and how our electoral system works. Below I have attempted to summarise this as best I can.

Government in South Africa comprises 3 separate but related spheres:

• Local Government = Municipalities and the elected Public Representatives (politicians) are councillors.
• Provincial Government = Provinces and the Public Representatives (politicians) are MPL’s (members of the provincial legislature)
• National Government = South African Government and the Public Representatives (politcians) are MP’s (Members of Parliament)

In Local Governments, half the councillors are directly elected to represent the people living in municipalities’s wards and the other half are “Proportional Representation” or PR councillors and are chosen by the party on the basis of the % the political party won. Thus there are twice as many councillors as there are wards in a municipality. Usually PR councillors are “deployed” to shadow the ward councillor in another ward with a view to winning the voters of that ward over in the next election.

Only in Local Government is any politician elected directly – ie. you vote for a person. In the rest of the spheres the political parties choose who will be appointed.

Thus, if a politician must be replaced in the Provincial or National spheres, the party just replaces them.

In the local sphere however, because ward councillors are directly elected, a by-election must take to allow the community to elect a new person to represent their community.

All SA reps are elected for 5 year terms.

There will be a by-election in Ward10 (Kloof, Gillitts, Hillcrest, Winston Park, Everton, Stockville) on May 5th 2010.

Please make sure that you are registered to vote. The last day to register is 25th March 2010 and that is only at the following location:

Hillcrest Sizakala Centre
22 Delamore Road, Hillcrest
Until March 25th Only
07h30 to 15h30

If you have not registered by 25th March 2010 you will not be able to vote in this by-election in Ward 10.

As a result of the resignation of Terence Palmer as a councillor, a municipal by-election will be held to replace him in Ward 10 (Kloof/Gillits).

Details are as follows:

Note: A by-election will be held in Newcastle on the same day.

Voter Registration
Continued registration at Hillcrest Sizakala Centre, 22 Delamore Road 07h30 to 15h30 weekdays (excl. public holidays) until 25 March only. Alternatively, voters can register at IEC offices in 75 Winder Street (08h30 to 17h00 weekdays).

Cllr Gill Noyce
The Democratic Alliance has nominated PR Councillor Gill Noyce to stand in this election. Cllr Gill Noyce can be contacted on 082 800 0943 or email on gnoyce@zamail.co.za

What is a by-election?
Each Ward in the City (eThekwini) is represented by a councilor on the City Council. In the event that a sitting councilor must be replaced, a by-election is held by the IEC which allows residents of that ward to choose who will represent them on the City Council.

Who can vote in the Ward 10 by-election on May 5 2010?
Anyone who is a registered voter AND is registered in one of the following six voting stations:
Kloof Town Hall
Gillitts Community Hall
Kloof High School
Hillcrest Library Activities Room
Kloof Tennis Club
New Life Family Church

Note: Voting stations are open from 7am to 9pm on 5 May 2010

How can I check if I am registered in one of the above stations?
You can check if and where you are registered using the following methods:
• SMS your ID number to 32810
• Call the IEC on 0800 11 8000
• Use the IEC website and type in your ID number: https://www.elections.org.za/AmRegister/AmRegister.aspx

Can the DA remind me to go and vote on 5 May?
Yes, send your street address, email address, ID number (so we do not have duplicated records in our database) and cell number to com2@kzn.da.org.za and we will ensure you are reminded on election day!

UPDATE: This letter was edited and published in The Mercury on Thursday 30 July, 2009:

Service delivery protests are taking place around South Africa with a new and dangerous intensity; the very people who voted the ANC to a landslide in April are fuming. Marchers bearing signs like “AWB was better than ANC” are clearly expressing their disappointment in Government’s poor track record in service delivery, rampant corruption and power abuse, and the widening gap between the ever wealthier elite and the poor.

Voters in the recent 2009 General Election handed the ANC nearly two-thirds of the ballots cast; some in support of their erstwhile liberators and the rest in the hope that the messianic man of the people, Jacob Zuma, would bring them the better life they had been promised since 1994.

The hope which President Zuma  inspired in ANC voters even took grasp inside some of us in the opposition, but is rapidly fading.  The President has been sadly absent since April and has not followed through in any significant manner on his promises to deal with the evils of “the better life for all”.  The President promised to take a hard line on corruption and lazy public servants but very little, if any, of that promised new approach has been activated.

The bulk of service delivery happens in the local, and as far I am concerned, most important sphere of government.  Local governments (read “Municipalities”) are responsible for providing South Africans with the basic services required to live a respectable life: water, electricity, clinics, roads.  Providing and maintaining municipal infrastructure requires skills and experience, and it follows that most of the service delivery inertia experienced over the past decade and a half has been as a result of the ANC’s overly aggressive transformation programme.  In the name of transformation and to the detriment of millions of poor South Africans, local governments were stripped of their experienced and qualified engineers, technicians and officials, replacing them with deployed cadres and their comrades.

In 2011, South Africans will again go to the polls in the Local Government Elections and choose who they wish to run their municipalities; choose who they trust to deliver them the basic services and infrastructure which they have been promised for over 15 years.

If the poor want to see a change in the performance and attitude of the people tasked with improving their quality of life, they need to cast their ballots accordingly.  Organisations which represent the poor and unemployed need to make it their jobs to ensure the poor are made aware of this important choice and the parties which have a track record in delivering quality and reliable services and infrastructure to all South Africans living in their municipalities.

In the interest of the poorest and most neglected South Africans, the state of our democracy is in dire need of a corrective adjustment.  Protest as they might, it will take nothing less than functional democracy to see the proper and accountable performance of any sphere of Government.  Politicians have surprisingly ample “political will” when they are under threat of being voted out if they do not perform; a concerningly absent aspect of our democracy as it has existed in South Africa since 1994.