SA apathetic for young democracy – less than 2/3 of eligible voted in ’09

Democracy is a funny thing. People fight and die to win the right to self-determination, and then, when they get it, they shrug their shoulders and watch TV. In established democracies like the US, voter turnout is very low – less than half of the people who are eligible to vote actually do so. People feel disconnected from politics, and they feel that their votes don’t matter, so they protest by staying home on election day. In a young democracy like South Africa, however, one would expect that people would still feel energised about politics, and would be keen to get out and make themselves heard. Yet, sadly, that isn’t the case. Turnout in South Africa is low – around 60% – and people feel increasingly remote from politics. With the youth in particular turning away from politics and rejecting the process, one wonders what fate lies in store for the country’s nascent democracy. – FD

ALEC HOGG:  Twenty years into democracy, does South Africa really have a good story to tell?  Well, we’re going to find some answers to the questions with Georgina Alexander, who is from the South African Institute of Race Relations.  She’s with us in the studio.  Georgina, it’s good to have you here.  Thank you for coming through.  We’re just less than two weeks….  In two weeks today, we’re going to be going to the polls in South Africa and making our crosses.  There’s quite a lot of concern that people are going to vote the way they always have voted, no matter what seems to be happening in the outside environment.  Is this to be expected in a young democracy?

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  Well look, voting is a very important part of democracy, obviously.  What we’re finding in opinion polls is that many people who are choosing not to vote – almost 25 percent of people polled, said they weren’t going to vote – and when they were asked why they weren’t going to vote, they said that ‘do you know what, it doesn’t matter which party we vote for.  It’s all going to be the same and my vote’s not going to make a difference’.  Many people out there are feeling very disenfranchised and very disillusioned, and we see the manifestations of that through the service delivery protests, especially.  In 2009, 41 percent of eligible voters didn’t vote, which is a massive proportion, and it was actually more than the eligible voters who voted for the ANC.  In a young democracy, it is therefore important to get the citizens involved and feel as though they have a voice through their vote.

 

ALEC HOGG:  It is rather apathetic if you have more people who didn’t vote than those who actually did vote for the ruling party.

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  Yes, and that was in 2009.  This election, I think is going to be slightly different.  There’s a lot more energy, interest, and excitement about this election.  More I think, because we want to know what’s going to happen.  For example, is the ANC going to drop below the 60 percent mark?  Is the EFF going to do well?  What’s going to happen with Agang?  Many of those issues around the elections will hopefully, draw many more voters out this time.  In a young democracy, when you have such high levels of apathy, it is a very big problem.

 

ALEC HOGG:  In the Sunday Times’ survey, which the published over the weekend – and you have to believe that such a big newspaper would get something that has credibility – they’re saying the ANC will come in virtually where they were last time on the one hand, and secondly, that only one in three young voters have registered.

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  Yes, many polls will say that the ANC is going to come out basically, exactly where they are but the polls are very temperamental.  It goes with the attitude on the day, at the time, so you have to take polling data with a pinch of salt.  However, it is quite worrying that many young voters are choosing to not vote, but in the general scheme of things, they only form six percent of the eligible voters.

 

@alechogg parties should put less effort into fighting for each other’s votes and rather aim to convince the non-voters…

— Pranesh Luckan (@LifeofPiLuckan) April 23, 2014

ALEC HOGG:  But why are young people not taking an interest in this?

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  I’m not too sure.  It could be a number of factors as I’ve said the way people were polled…we have to take it with a pinch of salt.  They feel as though their votes are not going to make a difference anyway, no matter who gets into power, no matter whom they’re voting for, they feel that their votes are actually not going to carry any weight, that it’s not going to make a difference, and so they’re choosing not to.  Maybe they just want to go away for that public holiday.  There also seems to be quite a…  I looked at a specific poll about youngsters involved in politics and in conversations with their friend, how much do they talk about politics, and almost half of them said that they don’t really talk about politics at all.

 

ALEC HOGG:  It was interesting.  Don Tapscott is a gentleman that I was exposed to for the first time at the World Economic Forum.  He’s just done a research report on eleven-and-a-half thousand young people who say they don’t care – these Americans.  They don’t care about the political process because why should they participate in something where they come to you every five years, promise you things they aren’t going to deliver, rule you for the next five years, and spend 70 percent of that time raising money.  Now, that’s the American system and I guess, in South Africa young people might think the same way.

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  I think it would go along the same lines in South Africa as the States…this disinterest that ‘because my vote’s not going to mean anything’, but America has quite an entrenched, established, and mature democracy.  Theorists who want to look at voter apathy in more mature democracies, they basically say that people feel their system is running effectively and there’s no real need to vote because they’re quite happy with the status quo.  There might be a few niggles and gripes along the way.  As you say, they’re just about fundraising and politicians making political speeches.  In a youthful democracy and a democracy that is still very young, it is very important to get the people to vote because that’s a very true indication of how they’re feeling, and it’s also a way for political parties to take the temperature of what’s going on.

 

ALEC HOGG:  How do you get young people interested?

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  It’s a very good question.

 

ALEC HOGG:  If Nkandla is not going to interest them, what will?

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  No, that makes them angry.  I think the big key is probably education.  In terms of millennium development goals, over the last 20 years, we have made a lot of progress in terms of primary education, primary enrollment, and getting people to finish their primary education.  Then the problem comes in at the high school level, and then at the tertiary level.  We see that people who are more educated have more interest in politics, so that maybe that feeds in because our education system as we well know, is failing our youngsters in terms of providing them with the requisite skills to get into the job market.  It’s maybe also failing them in the sense of getting an interest in what’s actually going on in the country.

 

ALEC HOGG:  Georgie, from the Institute of Race Relations, did you agree with what we saw in the Sunday Times?  Four percent for the EFF, a bigger share for the DA, and 65 percent for the ANC.  Are your polls showing the same thing?

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  We are expecting the ANC to drop below 64 percent, so we’re looking at a range – we’ll speak in ranges, rather – we’re looking at anything between 61 and 65 percent for the ANC, and the DA maybe going to 22 percent.  EFF is very interesting, because it’s very hard to tell what’s really going to happen.  We haven’t really seen them in any polls beforehand – election polls, that is – but we think the EFF are appealing to the unemployed youth.  As we all know, that’s a very big proportion of the population.

 

ALEC HOGG:  I was talking to a professor from Wits over the weekend and he said to me that the young students are primarily Red Berets.

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  Yes, I’d expect to see that.

 

ALEC HOGG:  The unemployed youth and smart young guys.

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  Smart young guys, but in the sense that you see there aren’t enough opportunities for the university graduates.  They’re thinking ‘where are we going to go next’ because there aren’t enough jobs in the economy, and because we’re not growing at the rate we’re supposed to grow at.  The NDP want us to have eleven million jobs created by 2030, but we need to grow at five-point-four percent in the economy, and we’re not achieving that.  These young people, who are educated, think ‘where am I going to be able to go?  Who’s going to give me an option?’

 

ALEC HOGG:  It’s almost like…right at the bottom where there is no hope, perhaps Julius Malema gives them hope and then, people who are smarter, who worked hard, and who have more knowledge are saying ‘we need an alternative’.

 

GEORGINA ALEXANDER:  Exactly.

 

ALEC HOGG:  Fascinating.  Georgie, thank you.  I’m sure we’ll talk to you again as we get closer and closer to the most important election that the young democracy has had.  That was Georgina Alexander, a researcher from the South African Institute of Race Relations.  Don’t forget to tune in to our comprehensive coverage on Election Day on the 7^th of May.  We’ll be focusing our attention on the day’s events and various business elements thereof.