The vexed act of voting in South Africa’s Election 2024 - SABC News - Breaking news, special reports, world,

Thumbs up, voting done, a group of friends show their inked thumbs after participating in the Local Government Elections in Pretoria, 01 November 2021.Professor Susan Booysen, is a political analyst, Director of research at MISTRA, and visiting professor at the Wits School of Governance

As context, in the last two years surveys such as those by the Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection , the Human Sciences Research Council , and most recently Afro Barometer have shown that South Africa is ‘a nation divided’ when it comes to coalitions. Despite being complicit, if not outright the cause of coalition malfunction, they aver that ‘coalitions are dangerous… vote for the big party and avoid coalitions’.

The voters of South Africa have the opportunity, if not task, to intervene through their ballots – if they choose to participate in the new transition. Yet their votes will be complex in that they will be voting not simply for one party, but also for possible coalitions that their party or parties of choice may form following the election.

There are many small and micro-parties that form a modest ‘buffer’ or satellite of mini-protectors around the ANC. A vote for them would in effect be a vote for the ANC. Whenever the ANC at the local government level had experienced coalition majority problems, they had come to the rescue. Examples include Al Jama-ah, African Independent Congress, the African People’s Convention , the United Democratic Movement , Good, the National Freedom Party, and many others.

Amid these party political complications the baton is now being handed to the ‘ordinary’ voters of South Africa. This time around, they face the ballot choice between not just simply 52 parties, but simultaneously the secondary choice between the main parties and their satellites of associates.

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