The department of home affairs opposes all of the many objections against aspects of the electoral amendment bill raised in public hearings held throughout the country by parliament’s home affairs committee.
So any changes in the bill, which provides for the representation of independent candidates in elections for national and provincial legislatures, will have to be made by the committee, which will deliberate on the bill in May, with a view to finalising it on May 24.
The amendment bill arises from the Constitutional Court judgment ruling that the Electoral Act is unconstitutional in providing only for the election of candidates through their membership of political parties and in not providing for election of independent candidates. The court gave parliament 24 months until June 10 to rectify this deficiency.
The department took a long time to come up with a draft. Home affairs minister Aaron Motsoaledi told MPs during a committee meeting on Friday that the department had to study electoral systems around the world.
As a result, the bill was introduced in the National Assembly only on January 10, and parliament will not meet the June 10 deadline. Parliament’s presiding officers have applied to the court for an extension of six months. After the committee’s deliberations, the bill will have to be adopted by the National Assembly and then processed by the National Council of Provinces.
Motsoaledi stressed that there was “no electoral system anywhere in the world that is so perfect as to meet all the concerns and the desires of people in that particular country”.
The department’s response to issues raised in public hearings was given on Friday by its director-general Tommy Makhode. The department has not changed its position on controversial issues such as allocation of seats to independent candidates, filling of vacant seats between elections and discarding of votes in excess of the threshold needed by independent candidates to gain a seat.
Opponents of the proposed seat-allocation system in the bill — 200 regional seats would be allocated for individual candidates and 200 for political parties — said that it was biased in favour of political parties in terms of the number of votes required to get a seat and that all 400 National Assembly seats should be equally contested by independent candidates and political party candidates.
Those in favour of the bill on this issue said the provisions in the bill allowed for continuation of the proportional representation system.
On discarded votes Makhode said “there is no practical system of which we are aware that would avoid this ‘wasted’ votes issue”. He insisted that there was no unfairness in this and that those opposed to discarding votes had not offered an alternative solution.
Makhode said there was no way to hold by-elections when a seat was left vacant by an independent candidate — the bill proposes that it be left vacant until the next election — as constantly holding by-elections would be impractical and be a strain on the fiscus.
On the number of signatures required for a candidate to qualify to stand for election Makhode said the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) will decide what number is reasonable when it makes regulations. The IEC will also set the nonrefundable deposit fee to be paid by independent candidates.
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