Friday 30 September 2016

South Africa's Surprising Maturity

South Africa has had nationwide local government elections - these have passed off peacefully and with nearly 80% of the votes counted the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) says voter turnout stood at about 58% of eligible voters - slightly more than the previous municipal elections in 2011.

ANC Stay In Power But Not Everywhere ..... But Peacefully
ANC Stay In Power, But Not
Everywhere ..... But Peacefully

More importantly the vote was peaceful and there was even enough space for the IEC boss Mosotho Moepya, to appeal for patience, as people waited for final results, saying his team wanted to make sure there was "due diligence and accuracy”. Mr Moepya also thanked over 200,000 election officials for their work, as well South Africans for voting peacefully and passionately.

This event, which would be considered normal in Europe or North America is actually remarkable in Africa (North or South), particularly as the ruling ANC party did not perform as well as on previous occasions ... there were even early suggestions that it was losing in some areas (although retaining an overall lead) ... normally in Africa the start of riots as fraud is suspected or attempted.

With more than 60% of ballots counted in the key South Africans municipality of Nelson Mandela Bay, the opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) had a significant lead at 54% with the African National Congress (ANC) trailing behind at 36%. The two other big cities making headlines in this high stakes race - Pretoria and Johannesburg - saw the two major parties running neck and neck with the ANC eventually losing its majority in both cities. Still its remarkable that it lost votes to the Democratic Alliance and Economic Freedom Fighters, and there was no violence.

Zimbabwe Showing Unrest
Zimbabwe Showing Unrest ....

Compare and contrast with the unravelling in neighbouring Zimbabwe where not only are there normal protests at the handling of the economy but the party cadres aka 'War Veterans' (many of whom weren't born when the 'war' was being fought), are also in turmoil. President Robert Mugabe has expelled four senior war veterans from Zimbabwe's ruling Zanu-PF party after they issued a statement withdrawing their support for the President.

So congratulations to all South Africans for giving an example to the rest of the continent on how to mature a democracy .....

2 comments:

  1. It's strange that in SA democractic accountability has taken hold but not next door in Zimbawe. Sadly corruption has taken hold equally in both countries. It's just the outcomes whn caught with your fingers in the till that are different.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Your right. Corruption has taken a firm grip amongst the ANC politicians and civil servants. Thanks for the comment.

      Delete

All comments are welcomed, or even just thanks if you enjoyed the post. But please make any comment relevant to the post it appears under. Off topic comments will be blocked or removed.

Moderation is on for older posts to stop spamming and comments that are off topic or inappropriate from being posted .... comments are reviewed within 48 hours. I don't block normal comments that are on topic and not inappropriate. Vexatious comments that may cause upset to other commentators, or that are attempting to espouse a particular wider political view, are reviewed before acceptance. But a certain amount of debate around a post topic is accepted, as long as it remains generally on topic and is not an attempt to become sounding board for some other cause.

Final decision on all comments is held by the blog author and is final.

Comments are always monitored for bad or abusive language, and or illegal statements i.e. overtly racist or sexist content. Spam is not tolerated and is removed.

Commentaires ne sont surveillés que pour le mauvais ou abusif langue ou déclarations illégales ie contenu ouvertement raciste ou sexiste. Spam ne est pas toléré et est éliminé.