Issued by Daniela Ellerbeck on behalf of the FW de Klerk Foundation on 31/10/2024

Today, the FW de Klerk Foundation made a written submission to the Electoral Reform Consultation Panel. The submission was in response to the Panel’s invitation for comments on why, how and whether South Africa’s present electoral system should be reformed, changed, or even replaced.

“The Foundation pointed out to the Panel that the current electoral system fails to meet all of the Constitution’s requirements. Specifically, it fails to ensure accountability, responsiveness and openness,” says Daniela Ellerbeck, an attorney and the FW de Klerk Foundation’s Constitutional Rights Programmes Manager. “It also fails to meet four out of the Panel’s six guiding principles for an electoral system. For this reason, changing how South Africa elects those in our national and provincial parliaments is both justified and necessary,” explained Ellerbeck.

Besides meeting the Constitution’s requirements, the Foundation submitted that the new electoral system must also help to prevent state capture from ever reoccurring and must cause elected officials to be more accountable and responsive to the public. It must also build public trust and increase voter turnout. Lastly, it must also create a level playing field between independent candidates and political parties.

“For these reasons the Foundation supports a mixed-member proportional system with 250 seats (of Parliament’s 400) being from single-member constituencies. This will allow voters to have a direct link to their constituency’s candidates running for a seat in Parliament. Simultaneously, voters will be able to recall underperforming elected officials. This will increase accountability and responsiveness, resulting in the public’s trust being restored in the democratic system, which, in turn, will increase voter turnout,” states Ellerbeck.

The Foundation believes such an electoral system will also result in overall proportional representation, while allowing for independent candidates to compete on a level playing field with political parties.